Hong Kong produces very little spam; it is only responsible for 5% of its own spam traffic. There has been little formal effort to regulate or punish spammers, though groups are pressuring the government to regulate spam with new laws.
In
August 1999, a magistrate ruled that a systems admininstrator had committed no crime by using two other networks to send thousands of spam e-mails. Critics noted that using an open mail relay violated laws against using others’ computers, but they couldn’t prove it in this case. Aside from the server hijacking, there was simply no crime. Today, servers in Hong Kong are probably much less vulnerable to an attack on an open relay, but the law against spam is the same: none.
About 61% of Hong Kong households have Internet access (about 66% in the US). Hong Kong estimates 5% of its spam is from Hong Kong and another 20-40% is from Asia, mostly from China.
ISPs recommend private filtering, since ISP level filtering violates privacy laws.
The Hong Kong Anti-Spam Coalition, formed by the Hong Kong Internet Service Providers Association (HKISPA), Asia Digital Marketing Association (ADMA), and businesses including Microsoft and Time-Warner, has proposed legislation and is currently lobbying for it. The Coalition claims spam costs HK$2 billion a year
(about US$250 million). It cites a December 2003 survey showing over 80% of Internet users favor government spam regulation, and 70% of those favored government legislation, though many expressed concerns about free speech. The legislation proposed seems to be modeled on Korea’s successful regulations. It proposes civil and criminal penalties, opt-out requirement, “ADV” labeling, ISP rights and penalties for routing.
Critics claim legislation should be only part of larger efforts to combat spam in Hong Kong, stressing education, training, and anti-spam technology.
For other countries, see the Spam Laws Worldwide Index.