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Louisiana Tries Anti-Spam Law
chompyZ writes "The legislative battle against SPAMMING heats-up as a new law became effective yesterday in Louisiana. According to KPLC, the new law requires senders of sexually explicit e-mail to include a note in the subject line, "adv-adult," to let unsuspecting internet users know ahead of time. The Olympian reports that Louisiana officials actually think this will be effective... leaves you wondering if "officials" have any clue how SPAMMERS operate..."
Now subjetcs will be
adv-adult: Enlarge your penis
Way to go, I just don't know if this way leads somewhere:)
Signature Pro version 1.13.2-3 release 83.5 beta3try7 after-breakfast edition
Though the paragraph is somewhat pessimistic the concept is a good one. Why not try? If it works, great, if not then tweak it till it does. I hope more states try something.
"If you are on fire you can just stop, drop, and roll. If you fall into Lava you are just dead." - my 5yr old daughter
and so I don't know the law you have there, but won't it just cause spammers to move outside Louisiana?
Subject: adv-4dult
Body:
Fr33 g0at pr0n c!ick h3re!
I'm waiting to see how futile an http://donotspam.gov would be.
Hard loop..... huh?
Dynamic Designs
Most every porn type email I get can be traced back to servers in China or The Netherlands. I doubt those Cajuns will be going overseas anytime soon to prosecute.
Hmm, just got a new porn email, from Pythonvideo, up in Canada. Hope those guys have a large travel budget.
Pete Carr Owner Chatmag.com
...but they will be breaking a law in a clear cut manner, and that will be enough to start prosecuting. Jail time is the greatest way to punish someone, you effectively rob them of freedom, which you only have a finite amount of.
"adv-adult: Fill your prescriptions from Canada, save up to 80% !"
That would be really helpful if I not only didn't have a spam filter, but took the time to read every spam that didn't have a pornographic title.
Of course, this only applies to louisianans who send non-anonymous pornographic spam to other louisianans.
Spammers are already breaking laws; highjacking mail servers, using trojans such as 'jeem' and 'proxy-guzu' to make others send spam, etc. I doubt this law is going to be the one that finally makes them operate ethically.
Perhaps they need to also make it a crime for an individual in the state to purchase a product or service from a spammer...
Whenever the offence inspires less horror than the punishment, the rigour of penal law is obliged to give way...
It may be ineffective in getting spammers to stop their penis and lolita porn spams, but it does give the state a way of prosecuting spammers. Remember, going after a criminal is just a matter of technicality. After all, they got Al Capone for tax evasion of all things.
Steve's Computer Service, Hobbs, NM
At least spammers operating inside the U.S. will be a little nervous when they get several notifications from lawyers after it was traced back to them. Bouncing emails off of or originating from foreign mail servers may be effective for not being able to do anything at the ISP level but if they are caught in their apartment standing in a room full of penis enlargement pill cases where the law can reach them at a business level..... They'll probably wish they hadn't sold it to all those prisoners who are winking & saying "you're my little puppy now".
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I - I took the one the bus load of girls just went down.
The above article has been tampered - not just a mirror.
* Require welfare recipients to immediately begin looking for work once they receive their ass cheeks and to learn how to write a resume or prepare for an interview for a minimum number of hours each week or risk losing their benefits.
Most spammers operate out of other countries these days, as do telemarketers. If you ask one the next time one is on the phone, they usually call from another time zone or Canada (if the target is American). Most spammers operate from servers in Canada or small Pacific Rim countries that would prove immune from this law anyway. Note also that most of these sexually explicit e-mails are easily recognized by anyone literate as they tend to accumulate several consonants at the end of the e-mail title that form babble instead of coherent words. I find this an example of people saber-rattling in preparation for re-election campaigns, especially given that several other meaningless "vote-for-me" laws were modified or enacted at the same time. These include:
-no more execution of the mentally retarded (already mandated by the Supreme Court)
-allows telemarketers to call you if you "are referred to them by someone you know"
-increase penalties against drunk drivers who kill or seriously injure people while driving with over a 0.2 blood alcohol level (as if attempted/ murder is not serious enough to get life in prison anyway)
-no credit card company can give out anything of value to students unless they also get a brochure
Some of the new laws make sense, but again there are enough of weird and nonsensical laws that I wonder if such would make it to the legislative table, much less get passed, if not for the election coming up in about a year's time. Until then I await the first case of a spammer getting tried under this law if he/she/it/they are operating from another state or country.
As long as there is a Second Amendment, there will always be a First Amendment.
As each state and locality implement their own variant, some requiring "ADV:" in the subject line, some requiring "ADULT:" and this one requiring "adv-adult", all a spammer will have to do is claim that he can't possibly satisfy all of the constraints. Why can't we have a header which marks spam as spam, such as "Solicited: no"? Or just require that all spam use "Precedence: bulk"?
Not that any of this will be effective... but if they have to legislate something...
Check out my webcam!
You can't mod me down! I had adv-adult in the subject line!
Karma: SELECT `karma` FROM `users` WHERE `userid`=138474;
The problem is getting spammers to honor the law. First of all, I assume (the article did not say) that the law can only affect spammers who are based in Louisiana. That will not even chip away at spammers. Even if it were nationwide, it would be very difficult to chase down even those spammers inside our borders, and impossible to affect those outside.
If it did work, it would make filtering "adult" spam very easy. And I would find it gratifying merely to see a few spammers behind bars, or at least fined out of their livelyhood, for inundating us with piles and piles of junk.
Handy for those with a spam filter, now you can save the only interesting spam from going to dev/null.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
Nope, what it would lead to it would be something like that.
.X.X. mailer
Predefined filter in newer mailers:
move all mssages where subjects contain adv-adult
to folder Personal Folders/Scientific matters against world extinction
and next advertising will be something like protect your self against mom raiding your computer. Use
Signature Pro version 1.13.2-3 release 83.5 beta3try7 after-breakfast edition
coming from the state that brings you drive-through daquiri huts. There's a law in Louisiana that says you can't have an open container of liquor in your car. Somehow having a styrofoam cup with a lid and a straw is still a closed container. It's things like this that made me move away from that God-forsaken state. :)
as 99.9% of spam i recieve is usa based and iam not a USA resident or have any buisness there i managed to block it all simply by filtering the $ sign, works great and hasnt created a false positive in 2years of using this method
This law will get precisely zero (0) significant coverage in-state. The legislature probably passed it to see if they could get some easy extra money for the budget. If push came to shove, they'd drop the issue. BTW, if you're 65 or over and are a victim, the offender must pay double. Check the notes on the law, in a link I posted earlier.
Just gather spam and fine the spammer's client.
That'll make the clients go away and kill the spam industry. Let'em use another means of advertising because spamming will cost them tens of tousands of dollars a copy.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
Actually, many spammers operate from INSIDE the United States, they simply hire companies outside the United States to send/route the spam.
By "decrease", of course, I mean "exponentially increase unabated just as it has been doing for the last several years".
Roving Web-Teleoperated Robot
If I send unsolicited porn through the USPS I can be arrested, why is email any different? You don't hear to many people screaming that not allowing porno junk mail is a violation of freedom of speech.
We don't HAVE TO BE JUST LIKE THE SPAMMERS (in only six months!)
Click to remove and never hear from this /. user again oulsscs tyhecfz gy pz
kephqfh jt qwuixcdkejmpki bk niomleh n
t u
You want to see an online community where we all live by our own code of ethics?....
Fine. Earlier today I caught some asshole trying to run his spam through my mail server. The headers also showed him forging email addresses in my own domain name.
My "own code of ethics" is to pound this guy into a bloody pulp, then pound him some more. I doubt that you'll find many people in this situation who disagree with this attitude - this jerk is trying to profit by abusing my good name! He doesn't care that his actions will result in me getting bounce messages, angry responses, and possibly even being blacklisted. Hell, that's his PLAN!
Do you really want to turn us loose on the net as vigilantes enforcing our own law? Even if I might have qualms about taking out his upstream ISP - hell taking out his entire country's net - if it's necessary to make him stop, others won't hold back.
For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. -- H L Mencken
Let's pass a law that forces district attorneys to actually prosecute spammers that break the law.
As a law-abiding spammer, how am I supposed to send both spam complying with the Louisiana law (including "adv-adult") and the Michigan law (containing "ADV:" as the first four characters?)
It would seem to me that I have to do something like this:
Subject: ADV: enlarge your penis [adv-adult]
I hope no new state laws are introduced, these are making it really tough to stay profitable.
I wonder if it's still legal to send
Subject: ADV: adv-adultery webcams!
The 'adv' still looks nasty, but I can't think of any word that ends in 'adv'.
As someone who spent a great many years living in Louisiana and following/participating in Louisiana politics, I know for a fact that the officials of the "great state of Louisiana" are quite incompetent. After all, we have the 2nd worst roads in the nation and the 2nd worst education system in the nation (thank god for Mississippi!).
Fight Spammers!
You should tell that to Louisiana spammer Ronnie Scelson, he seems to think that it's okay. But then he also thinks spamming is okay, and that Scooby-Doo is very deep.
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
>> leaves you wondering if "officials" have any clue how SPAMMERS operate..."
Actually it leaves me wondering if you have any idea how the law operates. As silly as this legislation may at first appear, you have to realize that (mostly) nothing is illegal unless there is a LAW to make it so. Yes, spam is already illegal in many states, but creating a law where spammers must insert adv-adult in their subject line is another point where would-be prosecutors can trip spammers up with, thus increasing penalties and even prison time. Its like when a murder is really heinous, prosecutors dont just try someone for murder 1, they get them on just about every count thats feasible to the case.
So let's say you limit those in the US from sending you spam, what are you going to do when they start relaying from borked out servers abroad... Better yet what can you do. Waste taxpayer money tracking down spammers abroad... Let's see $5000 to track them, another $1000 to bring them down here to face the music, $100,000k miminum for some sort of farce trial for something you could have taken care of with spamassassin.
Boy oh boy I don't know who is dumber the politician who passed this law or the spammer I hit d on using mutt.
MoFscker
There is no wondering here, we all know they don't have a clue in the world. But whats being done about that? I don't see any huge initiatives to educate our law makers into how these things really work. So what can Slashdot do to educate these people as to how spam really works?
Buy Steampunk Clothing Online!
In the first months after the law went into effect the percentage of spam attacks with "ADV" or ADV:Adult" in the subject line was a full 5% on average. This compared to the months before it became law, where only 1 out of 20 spam attacks contained these in the subject line.
This in the state with over 1/10th of the U.S.'s population.
Why is
"Great offer at Wal-Mart, 2 for 1 Washing powder"
more acceptable than
"Great offer at Sex-Mart, 2 for 1 Vibrators"
?
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
If this is modded +4, all of slashdot is going to need a adv-adult...
What? Why not everyone? Speed in LA, get a ticket. Thumb you nose at that ticket, go to jail. I don't see how spammers sending email to LA that breaks this law would be any different than violating a local speed limit. Spam me, get fined. Scofflaw the fine, go to jail. Seems easy enough, even if the vast majority of spammers get away with it, punishing a few will be sweet.
The implication that spam has a place in the world, if only it anounces itself, is one I don't like. It's kind of like saying, "It's OK to screw people if only you let them know it first."
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Because that's how Hormel spells it.
But spam is not SPAM. Hormel specifically asks that "SPAM" in all caps be reserved for referring to their product. They have been kind enough to not go nuts over trademark dilution, it would be nice if we could all use the colloquial "spam"
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
I just started using it and it's worked perfect so far.
I find it a little scary that small programs like Firebird and Thunderbird are infinitely more usable than MS products while costing infintely less. seems like some kind of conservation law is being violated.