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FTC Declares Can-Spam a Success

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the official-report-went-to-my-junk-folder dept.

TheSixth1 writes "ZDNet is reporting that the FTC announced in a recent report to Congress [PDF Warning] that the Can-Spam act is 'effective in providing protection for consumers.' The report boasts that the substantive provisions of the Act have mandated adoption of a number of commercial email "best practices" that many legitimate online marketers are now following. Second, the Act has provided law enforcement agencies and ISPs with an additional tool to use when bringing suit against spammers. The more than 50 cases brought to date by the FTC, the Department of Justice, state Attorneys General, and ISPs demonstrate CAN-SPAM's enforcement efficacy."

6 of 310 comments (clear)

  1. Whatever... by Dance_Dance_Karnov · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I still get 50 spams or so a day and only 25% or so are even in english.

  2. Success for who? by gujo-odori · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I work for one of the major email security companies. I can't say that CAN-SPAM has had much effect at all on spam and the spamming spammers who send it - we see just as much spam as ever, and it's just as obfuscated as ever. If anything, the spammers have evolved to be better at hiding their identities than ever before, to avoid CAN-SPAM prosecution. When the law took effect, zombies were out there, but there were also still a lot of netblocks handed to spammers by providers; now, zombies rule the day and static netblocks used by spammers are becoming rarer all the time. Defined in those terms, CAN-SPAM is a bust.

    However, if you want to define "success" as "Good for us and our competitors, who are all signing up lots of new customers every month and seeing better revenue streams all the time" then yes, CAN-SPAM is a resounding success :-)

  3. Re:If only they had listened to Slashdot by fmaxwell · · Score: 4, Interesting

    ... we'd still be relying on SPEWS to bully innocent bystanders

    By "innocent bystanders," do you mean people helping to finance an ISP which caters to spammers?

    into bullying ISPs into shutting down spammers after the event.

    So you would prefer that the ISPs not shut down spammers?

    You obviously don't understand SPEWS.

    SPEWS does not wait for spam to happen. They list IP blocks which have been repeated sources for spam. If an ISP sells services to spammers, their IP blocks will end up listed on SPEWs. Those using the SPEWS list can block all traffic from that ISP -- including traffic from spammers who will use those IP blocks in the future.

    Before SPEWS, "pink contracts" were becoming all-too common. A pink contract is a contract between an Internet service provider and a spammer in which the spammer is exempted from the usual terms of service prohibiting spamming. Pink contracts came into existence because ISPs could charge the spammer much more than they would a normal client. Such contracts were quite profitable.

    So how do you fight against such practices? You blacklist the ISP's IP blocks. That means that "normal" users will find that the ISP cannot reliably deliver e-mail. Those users will pressure the ISP into not writing pink contracts and not tolerating spamming. A blacklisted ISP will not be able to survive on pink contract revenue alone and, thus, will be forced to stop writing pink contracts in order to remain solvent.

  4. Title Misleading by kai.chan · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The title of the paper is misleading, it stated that the "FTC staff conducted interviews with 98 individuals," which suggests that with the "enactment of CAN-SPAM, spam volume has begun to decline as has consumer frustration". Of course, the paper is written in such a way that CAN-SPAM was responsible for the "technological and marketplace developments in email since the enactment of CAN-SPAM." In other words, this is nothing but a government agency trying to hide the uselessness of a law they passed by taking credit for the technological advancements that combat spam.

  5. How is that a success? by lord+sibn · · Score: 3, Interesting

    It was never the legitimate online businesses you had to worry about, anyway. The impetus to comply with the law only means increased operating expenses for legitimate businesses, and working overseas for the rest.

  6. Can Spam = 100% government corruption by Futurepower(R) · · Score: 4, Interesting

    It seemed to me that Can Spam was 100% government corruption. A few have been prosecuted, for show. However, spam has increased.

    The purpose of Can Spam was to stop U.S. states from enacting their own legislation. Can Spam made all the laws in the states invalid.