FTC says no to 'Do Not Spam'

Posted by   Virus Bulletin on   Jun 16, 2004

A 'Do Not Spam' list could actually increase spam levels, says FTC.

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has told Congress that a national 'Do Not Spam' registry is not appropriate at present - stating that, rather than addressing the problem of spam, such a registry could potentially increase levels of spam and could not be enforced effectively.

The creation, of a 'Do Not Spam' registry was recommended by the CAN-SPAM act, although the idea was not welcomed by the FTC at the time, since it did not believe such a list could be secured satisfactorily. The FTC has been working on its feasibility study of such a registry since then.

In its study the FTC investigated three different registry models:

• a registry of individual email addresses
• a registry containing the names of domains that did not wish to receive spam
• a registry of individual names that required all unsolicited commercial email to be sent via an independent third party that would deliver messages only to those email addresses not on the registry

However, it concluded that none of these would be able to be enforced effectively.

Instead, the FTC said that anti-spam efforts should focus on creating a robust email authentication system and to that end, the FTC has announced that it will be sponsoring a Fall 2004 Authentication Summit.

Copies of the FTC's report are available from http://www.ftc.gov/.

Posted on 16 June 2004 by Virus Bulletin

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