Re: [Asrg] FTC tells us what is SPAM (NO! what is commercial!)

[Amir Herzberg <herzbea at cs.biu.ac.il>]

> > FTC Issues Final Rule Defining What Constitutes a "Commercial Electronic 
> > Mail Message"

> This has vanishingly little to do with defining what spam is.

That's correct, and indeed I think the rule does not claim to define 
what is spam. Instead, it defines several classes of often-undesirable 
e-mail (commercial, etc.).

If e-mail belonging to such often-undesirable classes would have 
included an appropriate `warning` category label, this could provide 
very good mechanism for users and providers to filter out undesirable 
messages (based on user's and/or providers policies).

One possible (and imho very useful) definition of spam is `e-mail 
belonging ot one of the often-undesirable categories, but without an 
appropriate label`. The FCC rule may help define these categories, and 
technical mechanisms, and potentially complementary legal measures, can 
enforce appropriate labeling. See 
http://www.cs.biu.ac.il/~herzbea//Papers/ecommerce/Spam.htm for a simple 
 cryptographic protocol to enforce correct labeling for content 
selection (filtering).

Best, Amir Herzberg


  They're
> defining what messages are subject to the CAN SPAM act, which
> regulates all commercial e-mail, solicited and unsolicited.
>
> I don't think much of the rules that CAN SPAM defines, but don't shoot
> the messenger.  The Congress directed the FTC to regulate some kinds
> of email, and the FTC is clarifying what mail that is.
>
> Regards,
> John Levine, johnl at taugh.com, Taughannock Networks, Trumansburg NY
> http://www.taugh.com
>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Message: 3
> Date: Thu, 16 Dec 2004 13:13:29 -0800 (PST)
> From: William Leibzon <william at completewhois.com>
> Subject: Re: [Asrg] FTC tells us what is SPAM
> To: John Levine <asrg at johnlevine.com>
> Cc: asrg at ietf.org
> Message-ID:
> 	<Pine.LNX.4.60.0412161305200.29317 at cwhois1.completewhois.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>
> On Thu, 16 Dec 2004, John Levine wrote:
>
>
> > > FTC Issues Final Rule Defining What Constitutes a "Commercial Electronic
> > > Mail Message"
> > >
> > > Notice Includes Criteria For Determining the "Primary Purpose" of an
> > > E-Mail Message
> >
> > This has vanishingly little to do with defining what spam is.  They're
> > defining what messages are subject to the CAN SPAM act, which
> > regulates all commercial e-mail, solicited and unsolicited.
> >
> > I don't think much of the rules that CAN SPAM defines, but don't shoot
> > the messenger.  The Congress directed the FTC to regulate some kinds
> > of email, and the FTC is clarifying what mail that is.
>
>
> I agree. I've very little faith in the "You can spam all you want" act by 
> congress. It seems to have allowed large spammers to tell ISPs that they 
> are not doing anything illegal because they are CAN-SPAM compliant (which 
> might or might not be true, but verifying takes long time) and if ISPs do 
> threated a disconnect then they begin to use lawyers to keep them up longer.
>
> Nevertheless that Congress clarified what consititutes a COMMERCIAL EMAIL
> is very important because that directly related to UCE type of spam and
> commercial part is very often what makes a difference if deciding how to
> react to bulk sender on your net.
>
> ---
> William Leibzon
>    mailto: william at completewhois.com
> Anti-Spam and Email Security Research Worksite:
>    http://www.elan.net/~william/emailsecurity/
> Whois & DNS Network Investigation Tools:
>    http://www.completewhois.com
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