Spammers Pleased with 'Anti'-Spam Act

grung0r writes "A post at Ed Foster's Gripelog explains why the new anti-spam law that Congress is passing isn't a good idea: 'it's clear that only the Direct Marketing Association, Microsoft, AOL and a handful of others had any input into the law, because it's carefully crafted to allow the big marketers free reign. And the loopholes it provides them will be more than big enough to provide aid and comfort for the smallest and sleaziest of spammers as well.' More about the problems with the law can be found at cauce.org." The direct marketers are dancing in the streets over it.

Comments

Yay government.

[shystershep]

The lack of the private remedy is bad (there's nothing more intimidating than looking down the barrel of a loaded lawyer), but at least the law requires the spam to be labeled. That will make it a lot easier to filter out - - provided, of course, that those anonymous sellers of penis lengtheners obey the law. If you can't trust someone like that to be a law-abiding citizen, who can you trust?

Re:Yay government.

[satyap]

No, fuck no. I don't want want to filter the spam after it has already gotten into my system and is chewing its way through my procmailrc! I want it to stop outside my network.

no, it's meaningless

[Anonymous Coward]

I hate spammers, but this law is meaningless, as are ALL anti-spam laws:

1. Spammers will ignore the law. Which leads to the next point:

2. Laws are meaningless unless enforced. How will it be enforced? When I get hit with spam that violates this law, who do I complain to? Who will investigate my complaint and then pursue and punish the spammers?

3. Where will all the money and resources come from to enforce this law (see point #2 above) -- to actually enforce this law will take FAR more money and resources than anyone realizes or will admit.

And even if significant money and resources are allocated to enforce the law:

4. What about all the spam originating from servers outside the U.S.

Re:no, it's meaningless

[thentil]

How will it be enforced? When I get hit with spam that violates this law, who do I complain to? Who will investigate my complaint and then pursue and punish the spammers?

I shouldn't *have* to complain to someone, or rely on someone else to protect me - if I'm spammed, I want the ability to file a lawsuit - which this legislation prevents. The SEC is supposed to protect me from fraud, too - but they haven't been doing too good a job recently. If you call the FBI about fraud, they won't do anything unless your losses are above xyz amount. The point is, the government should be enabling the individual to protect himself, not forcing the individual to rely on an underfunded, overworked, special-interest-and-politically-compromised body.

So let me get this right

[jlechem]

It's not going to stop SPAM just make it honest. They have to provide a real address, label it as commercial, and provide an opt-out that really works. How does this keep me from getting SPAM? I don't give a rats ass about opt outs or addresses I don't want this crap in my in-box to begin with. I'm not even going to mention the bastards overseas who are under no obligation to follow these rules( like they would if they had to anyway).

RTFA

[nate1138]

Did you even bother to read the article? Yes, it has to be labeled as spam, but the label isn't defined. As a matter of fact, the label is up to the spammer to decide! The FTC is PROHIBITED by this law from defining the label. So how are you supposed to filter out mail based on an arbitrary label defined by the sender?