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Congress Loves Spam -- If It's From Congress
Makarand writes "According to this NY Times article (registration required), while Congressional members were busy
passing the U.S. anti-spam law that will go into effect on January 1, they were also busy
sending unsolicited e-mail to their constituents. This activity was aimed at growing the subscriber base receiving their political messages because these email lists are not subject to the normal 90-day blackout period before an election where members are forbidden to use taxpayer-supported Congressional mass communications. Consumer advocacy groups say that this policy may be unfair to the challengers because this loophole could be used by elected officials to communicate with voters right up to Election Day."
Yeah, and who thought they were stupid enought to put themselves equally under the law? They are politician's, for god's sake.
A blog like any other.
WASHINGTON, Dec. 27 -- Even as Congress was unanimously approving a law aimed at reducing the flow of junk e-mail, members were sending out hundreds of thousands of unsolicited messages to constituents.
The spasm of activity is aimed at attracting voluntary subscribers to the lawmakers' e-mail lists, which would not be subject to House rules that normally impose a 90-day blackout before an election for taxpayer-supported Congressional mass communications.
In September, the House Administration Committee voted, 5 to 3, along party lines to allow e-mail messages to the subscribers to be sent in the blackout period, but maintained the ban on free postal mail from House members to voters. The policy change affected only House rules and was not part of the junk e-mail legislation.
At least 40 House members have bought or agreed to buy e-mail address lists from at least four vendors. The lists, which each have tens of thousands of addresses, are generally created by a process called e-mail appending, taking voter registration files from a member's district. The next step is to cross match them with large databases of names and e-mail addresses assembled by consumer data companies like Equifax, which has a database of more than 75 million e-mail addresses. E-mail addresses can usually be found for 10 percent to 20 percent of the voter file.
Many members of Congress praise the new policy for allowing cheaper and more effective communications with constituents. But consumer advocacy groups say the policy may unfairly give an advantage to incumbents over challengers because it allows elected officials to use government resources to communicate with voters right up to Election Day. In addition, the consumer advocates say, sending bulk e-mail messages to constituents who have not agreed to receive it is essentially electronic junk mail, or spam.
The ability to communicate with constituents at taxpayer expense, the franking privilege, is one of the most cherished and controversial perks of office. For 30 years, advocacy groups have lobbied and sued Congress to try to close loopholes and stop abuses of the privilege.
Critics say the policy has created a significant new loophole.
"The core value is that you don't want to leverage technology to increase incumbent advantage," said Celia Viggo Wexler, research director at Common Cause, a group that has sued to limit franking. "What is troubling is that essentially the House is saying, `O.K., you can communicate with the constituency up to an election, and we're not really going to check what you are saying with them.' The point is without that kind of oversight, it's ripe for abuse."
Before the change, e-mail was subject to the same treatment as regular postal mail. Correspondence sent to more than 500 constituents had to obtain approval from the franking commission and was subject to a 90-day blackout before an election. But individual responses to citizens were not subject to the restrictions.
Congressional officials said the old policy was too cumbersome.
"Anything over 500 e-mails you had to submit that to the franking commission," said Brian Walsh, the Republican spokesman for the House Administration Committee. "There was going to be a delay of a couple of days to get approved. We didn't feel that was consistent with the technology that existed."
The new policy says that lawmakers can freely send messages to voters who have agreed to subscribe to their e-mail lists. To build such lists, House members are sending huge amounts of bulk e-mail messages to their districts in the hope that some voters will subscribe.
The unsolicited messages go out from Congressional offices as often as twice a month. The unsolicited messages, which have to stop 90 days before an election or a primary, are still subject to approval from the franking commission.
"They are regulating commercial spam, and at the same time they are using the franking privilege to send unsolicited bulk communications which a
Spammers operate on the principle that even though 99% (or thereabouts) of recipients recognize and hate spam, the remaining 1% of fools are enough to make their business model viable. However, would this work for political spam? I mean, if more than 50% of recipients react negatively to it, its bad for the sender, isn't it? (IANAA, so correct me if I'm missing something :-)
Oh yeah, I remember: "Do unto others as you would have them do to you"...
Reminds me indirectly of the Euro-MP who complained that people were contacting her with their views. They ought to have just sat back and been told what they wanted....
Disgusted. Is it any wonder we regard politicians as full of (sh)it ?
Simon.
Physicists get Hadrons!
This shouldn't really come as to big of a suprise. Political acts have been exempted from major laws before. From the DoNotCall.gov FAQs:
The National Do Not Call Registry does not limit calls by political organizations, charities or telephone surveyors.
Political spam isn't to much different from unsolicited political phone calls. And both would surely be of intrest to the politicians, as they seem to have exempted them from the laws. I find political phone calls equally, if not more annoying, then people asking me if I want to save $.13 a year on my long distance bills.
Request: ECM unit, 1000 km fullerene cable, 1 tactical nuclear weapon. Reason: Birthday party for foreign dignitary.
I guess when the first email arrives from my representative or senator I will start using their email address when signing up for free offers and sweepstakes. That should give them lots of input from their constituents.
Following their example: it's ok as long as nobody says it's not.
I think spammers are going to start a bunch of lil grassroots political parties. They will band together and form the penis party, and sell penis creams, pills, and lord knows what else to "support" the party.
The only real solution is to have terrorists start using spam to fund their operations... only with that boogieman out of the closet will congress do anything about spam.
Political spam can be dealt with in a similar manner. "Promise" a vote and then on the day of the election write "Sucka. Did you really think I'd vote for a spammer?"
At the same time, sign these politicians up on mailing lists etc. that guarantee lots and lots of spam. And forward their addresses to those kind Nigerians who have more than enough money to help finance political campaigns.
People say I'm crazy, I got diamonds on the soles of my shoes...
There is the old story about the guy who takes a stack of bumper stickers for the opposing canidate and puts one on every cars bumper... With political spam it becomes SO much easier and fun. With to a bit of tech savy and good writting a great many fake messages could be sent out. I dare any politican to use this hardcore, because the backlash that could be unleashed against them would be frightfull once people learn that you really CAN get eail from your congresman!
I think it's a calculating move by politicians. With the SPAM bill they reduce the noise surrounding their own spam. I know that my grandparents didn't mind SPAM when they first got on the internet, when it was only ~1-5 per day. They stopped reading SPAM when it exploded to 100's per day.
If the SPAM bill helps cut that down to, say, 20 per day, politicians' own included, I think elderly people like my grandparents will start reading SPAM again. With the growing importance of the elderly voting population, I think SPAM can be quite important for these politicians.
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*beware the cute-bunny virus
It's the Congressional Members duty to keep their constituents informed. In a representative government, our elected officials must promote two way communication.
The Congress Online Project Nine Benefits of a good web site, number 3: "Targeted communication with key audiences. Web sites can help build ongoing relationships with key audiences by providing targeted features and information. Timely, informative sections of a Web site devoted to a single issue, for example, can attract people who care about the issue and keep them coming back for more. And issue-based e-mail updates provide the opportunity to regularly communicate with people who subscribe."
In order to fulfill the requirements of the Congressional "Franking" priviledge, Members would have to clearly identify emails sent to their constituents, with proper headers, From address, etc.
Also, in order to provide documentation that they are reaching their constituents, they would most likely be required to maintain an email mailing list.
I highly doubt that the Members would use the shotgun email tactic of spammers.
Pete Carr Owner Chatmag.com
And why should any of us be surprised by this? The politicians want to regulate it as long as it doesn't apply to them. I think that would cover quite a few things, not just spam.
...we are from the government - we are here to help...
If the email is sent using government, rtaher than private or party equipment, doe sthe list become a record that can be obtained using FOIA (Freedom of Information Act?) If so, Congress could very well help spammers harvest email addresses for at lost less than buying an email database that has been matched to records.
If you can get the list, how long before someone spoofs a Congressman's addresse and sends his or her constiuents an email that upsets them and forces the rep to deal with the backlash?
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.