Everyone seems to be complaining
about spam today. It's taking up too much bandwidth, too much time, too much
effort. It's making E-mail worthless and unreliable. Even the N.Y. Times is paying
attention to spam (free registration required to read the NY Times story).
But is it really a problem? Put your E-mail address on the Web and see what you
get (here's a study that
shows that even an invisible E-mail address on a Web page will bring you
spam).
You get spammed once, you're in for life.
Go ahead, click on the "unsubscribe" link and either run the unsubscribe
gauntlet or confirm
for the spammer that you're actually a real person with a real, live E-mail
address, and then watch the spam increase; of course, whether that's true or not
is subject to debate. It's interesting, though, that the primary disputant of that folk lore--the Direct
Marketing Association--doesn't make the vehicle of its dispute, its 2002 E-Commerce Report, available on the Web unless you join the
Association (the report claims that the
unsubscribe option is valid). Even the politicians
are sending spam (excuse me, sending unsolicited political announcements was
just an "innovative way to use the Internet"). Spam is an
exponentially expanding problem, eating up bandwidth, time, and effort. The story
of "Nadine" (who came into existence when someone typed an incorrect
E-mail address into a spam site's gathering tool) is probably a pretty common
one.
It's not like nothing is happening to counter spam. Online service
providers are fighting the use of their facilities for this stuff; AOL has had
some success, for example.
We could pass laws that would preclude any unsolicited commercial advertisements
being sent. So why isn't there a law?? Congress
just hasn't been moved to pass one at the federal level (though as eWeek
points out, we're still trying). Besides, national or state laws won't be likely
to reach spammers from other lands. And even if we had universal jurisdiction
through treaty or agreement, more often than not the return address on spam is
faked or forged or both. When we can't find the senders, we can't shut them
down. So we've tried going after the ISPs and users by blacklisting
those who let these people flood us with mail, either as subscribers or because
they don't secure their mail servers, again with some success (and again, not
without controversy).
Other than that we sit around and gripe and hit "delete" over and over
again.
Well, maybe now we (the little guys) have a new way to fight spam.
Inforworld ran a story on June 29 entitled "Sue
a spammer Today" (Gabor Por brought
this little legal gem to my attention; thanks Gabor!). The article tells the
story of how Ben Livingston has sued spammers in state small claims court, under
state anti-spam laws (which have
been upheld against commerce clause challenges at least once), and won. CNet
has also covered the issue. I wondered about this (as have some others along
with me); why do we complain about not being able to find the spammers? Spam
makes no sense if you can't find the person or business that is advertised in
the spam. Is there some reason we think we can only sue the person who actually sent
the spam? If there is, I haven't been able to figure out what it is.
I've received spam recently advertising Norton Utilities, Nokia Phones, and
X10.com (big surprise there; if I ever find anyone who's bought an X10 and
supported the most obnoxious advertiser on the 'Net, I'll have a fit). I receive
about 20 spam messages per day at my various E-mail addresses. But in each case,
as Ben points out, someone is advertising something. Even if I can't do
the Sam Spade or the SpamCop
thing and ferret out the sender, I can still ID the business that's selling the
thing (even if I have to pretend to want to buy the thing). They're responsible
for the spam, as much as the actual sender, aren't they (unless of course we
think spammers are now advertising products without authority; a strange notion
indeed and one I doubt is actually occurring)? Infoworld writer Brian Livingston
calls for "1,000 Windows users to do what Ben's doing." The idea:
maybe one person suing in small claims court won't stop the spammers, but maybe
one-thousand will. And if not one-thousand, maybe ten-thousand.
So, while spam continues to proliferate, and while the feds fail to stop the abuse of this new "costless" advertising method--costless, that is, unless you're receiving and dealing with it every day--maybe there is something we little guys can do. Let's sue 'em!