Time for Australia to show if it meant what it legislated. Australia's strict spam laws went into effect this weekend.
Australia's new spam policy, previously noted here, went into effect this weekend. The honestly titled Spam Act has a strict opt-in regime.
Since the Act passed last December, there has been speculation about what will happen. Some say that regulators and businesses do not understand the Spam Act and most businesses could be in violation. Others criticize the loopholes, suggesting pharmaceutical companies might be able to "sponsor" public service messages about drugs (though Spam Act might not look so kindly on this loophole). It is unclear who has changed what policies; nobody knows what will happen in the upcoming weeks.
There is no private right of action in the new Spam Act. All enforcement is from the Australian Communications Authority, which now has an online complaint form, complete with a downright good consumer guide to what should be reported. The ACA has suggested it is after a few spammers and plans to start sending warnings soon. The timeframe and scale of these efforts will be revealed soon enough.
This moment in spam law is interesting because Australia has the potential to place itself anywhere in the spectrum of legal spam remedies, including either extreme, all from one law. An overworked or underfunded ACA could accomplish nothing at all. A savvy ACA could charge the so-called spam kingpins and dramatically decrease spam volume while ignoring borderline spam. An overzealous ACA could severely limit e-mail communications, even prosecuting private e-mails with commercial content, like the standard example of a professor sending out an e-mail about her new book (although the Spam Act exempts her e-mails to former and current students). The impact and potential chilling effects of the Spam Act will not be found in its text; they will be created by the actions of a government agency in the upcoming months.
For other countries, see the Spam Laws Worldwide Index.