
Spammer escapes slammer (Updated)
The Lompoc Record is reporting that Jeffery Kilbride has escaped from the minimum security federal lockup. Kilbride was convicted in 2007 of offenses primarily related to the CAN-SPAM Act. Among the things that were apparently included was an allegation that Kilbride and his partner had impaired the ability to track them down by using false…
Ten Business Days Doesn’t Help
I unsubscribed from a mailing list recently. When I did, I was confronted with the following message: We’re sorry to see you go. You should be aware that it could take up to ten business days to completely remove your address from our lists. That’s a pretty standard disclaimer that complies with the time limits…
When is transactional mail not transactional anymore?
An interesting question came across my desk this morning. Here’s the request from someone we’ll call “Joe”: I need some help understanding CAN-SPAM requirements. I represent a membership organization. From time to time, we send marketing message to our members and, of course, some of the unsubscribe from those messages. Now we are getting to…
Use Private Domain Registration and Go to Jail?
The 9th Circuit opinion in USA v. Kilbride has been released. This is primarily an obscenity case against the defendants for sending pornographic spam email. But, it also includes a challenge to 18 U.S.C. § 1037 on vagueness grounds. 18 U.S.C. § 1037 is the part of the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 that deals with…

Confirm to unsubscribe?
A question comes in this morning: Requiring the confirmation of an email address in an unsubscription is not CAN-SPAM compliant, right? While I’m not a lawyer, to my understanding that is absolutely correct. The current implementing rules for CAN-SPAM state: Neither a sender nor any person acting on behalf of a sender may require that…

A CAN-SPAM Checklist
Today we’re going to create a checklist of things required for CAN-SPAM compliance. So, you want to make sure that you actually comply with the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 and not just say that you do. This post isn’t for you. You might learn something here and if you do, that’s great. But, instead, this…

Email is about relationships
Did you know that it’s entirely possible to learn the wrong lessons? Well, it is. I use Zemanta to suggest possible links for blog posts. As I was writing yesterday’s blog post, a suggested link came up dealing with CAN-SPAM and the definition of “spam”. That post by Roger Bauer shows how some people just…

Sending email to wireless domains?
One question that I get asked a lot has to do with sending email to wireless domains. So, I’ll lay out the answer here for all the world to see: No unsolicited messages may be sent to a recipient on a mobile domain for any reason, period. Here’s the general rule from the FCC’s Order…