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This acronym represents, Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography And Marketing Act of 2003. In 2003, President George Bush signed Public Law No. 108-187/S.877 that established the first national standard for the dissemination of commercial email and designated the Federal Trade Commission to enforce the provisions of the law. The official name, the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 is an acronym that works as an easy way to remember term, as it is also a play on the other term spam, used to describe unsolicited, malicious, and/or unwanted e-mail.
Conversely, the CAN-SPAM Act has also been dubbed, the “you-can-spam” act since it really is ineffective in regulating and preventing many types of spam and in many cases renders state laws of redress useless. It also prevents states from establishing stronger regulations and laws that prohibit punishment and the rights of individual users. And regardless of the law’s language, has been largely unenforced.
Modifications after the bill were signed into law by; adding a definition of the term “person”; modified the term “sender”; and clarified that a sender may comply with the act by including a post office box or private mailbox and clarified that to submit a valid opt-out request, a recipient cannot be required to pay a fee, provide information other than his or her email address and opt-out request, take any other steps other than sending a reply email message, or visiting a single page on an Internet website.
The CAN-SPAM Act, overall, permits any commercial entity to send email marketing newsletters as long as these additional compliance requirements are followed: 1) that there is a clearly placed link for a recipient to cancel all further communications from the sender with no stipulations or further information required to do so; 2) adult content is clearly labelled if included in the message or links provided; 3) accurate subject lines; 4) truthfully identified sender; 5) harvested email lists are strictly prohibited; 6) messages can not be sent from an open rely; and 7) only national security messages are exempt from one or more of the articles of the law.
Restrictions don’t apply to commercial entities from communicating with email newsletters to their existing customers regarding its services or products, nor does it require an opt-in by individuals who have previously inquired or communicated with the company for products or services, and have provided their email address for any other purpose. However, the unsubscribe requirement does remain and the sender of such messages, when an unsubscribe request is received, have no more than 10 days to comply with said request. They are also not exempt from providing a truthful header and if false header information is provided the entity can be charged with a misdemeanor. The CAN-SPAM act also defines an aggravated offense as any email message that is expressly intended to harvest emails, engages in IP address spoofing, is created for the delivery of a Trojan horse, virus, worm, or is using open mail relays for the purpose of sending spam.
CAN-SPAM provides a limited private right of action to Internet Access Services that have been adversely affected by the receipt of emails that violate the Act. A CAN-SPAM plaintiff must satisfy a higher standard of proof as compared with government agencies enforcing the Act; thus, a private plaintiff must demonstrate that the defendant either sent the email at issue or paid another person to send it knowing that the sender would violate the Act.
Over the years, other provisions, amendments, and stronger language has been added to the original Act, one being when Senator Corzine sponsored an amendment to allow bounties for some informants, although limited to 100K- and to date, no bounty has been awarded. Over the years a very small number of arrests and convictions have resulted from the act. The largest settlement for violating the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 came in March of 2006, filed by the Federal Trade Commission against Jumpstart Technologies, LLC for a long list of violations which resulted in a 900K consent decree.
