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Cyber Risks · Krebs on Security

Is it Time to Can the CAN-SPAM Act?

Summary: The U.S. Federal Trade Commission is asking for public comment on the effectiveness of the CAN-SPAM Act, the 14-year-old federal law signed by President George W. Bush in 2003 that bars spoofing the "from:" field in marketing email, requires sexually oriented spam to be labeled, and requires senders to honor opt-outs within 10 business days. Critics call it the YOU-CAN-SPAM Act because it does not require permission before sending and blocks states from enacting stronger protections, while EFF policy counsel Joe Jerome credits it with setting a baseline for commercial senders, and Cisco estimates 65 percent of all email sent today is spam, down only slightly from Postini's 70 percent estimate in 2004.

What you should know: A law that took effect in 2003 has moved the spam share of email from roughly 70 percent to 65 percent, and much of what remains is malicious email relayed through hacked servers whose owners do not know they are sending it.

Read the original at Krebs on Security ↗

Topics
Data Breaches
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