Should the Scourge of Computer Spam Be Regulated?

NewsMax.com ^ | Nov. 23, 2002 | Barrett Kalellis

[Paleo Conservative]

This will drive out the major companies that are just now starting to spam - Sears, Epson, Norton.

I got an email from Norton saying that the spam offers for Norton Systemworks were from unauthorized third parties.

[Naspino]

Yes -- I'd like to see Truth.Com take on this issue instead of cigarrettes. Some snazzy commercials with an extremely ugly chick holding up signs in front of Big-Spam Headquarter, giving ludicrous statistics that Big Spam kills 54 people every 1.33 seconds in America alone. Its time to brainwash the masses!!

[Poohbah]

It shouldn't be regulated. Purveyors of spam, however, should be terminated with extreme prejudice.

[Poohbah]

I got an email from Norton saying that the spam offers for Norton Systemworks were from unauthorized third parties.

That's what THEY say.

[Naspino]

E-mail Spam, Snail Mail Spam, and Telemarketers should all be eliminated. Actually today I received only one human telemarketer and four recordings. The recordings have been something relatively new to me in the past six months but they appear to have taken over.

[Naspino]

I got an email from Norton saying that the spam offers for Norton Systemworks were from unauthorized third parties. That's what THEY say.

Don't worry I'm sure they'll do an e-mail campaign apologizing for this -- or course they'll include a link to their newest "special".

[Poohbah]

BWAHAHAHAHA!

Next thing I hate: idiots who click "Reply to All" when telling people to quit sending group emails.

[aruanan]

Working Bayesian Mail Filter August 2002

I'd prefer the bastinado combined with property confiscation to solve the problem.

[Poohbah]

Email the spammer's home address to al-Qaeda, and tell them that the spammer said Osama was light in the loafers?

[steve-b]

The digression into porn is just that -- a red herring to divert attention from the actual issue, which is theft of services. The nature of the message sent over the stolen bandwidth is irrelevant.

The Monica given to the Direct Marketing Association in the penultimate paragraph suggests that this obfuscation is not accidental.

[MEGoody]

It's strange. . .the right to privacy is of utmost importance when it comes to abortion. But there's no problem with invading our privacy with a constant barrage of advertising in various forms.

[Malcolm]

Why can't they develop a system that returns the spammail to the sender without opening it, and gives a message not to e-mail that address again, and this be legally binding? If from outside the US, a filter for that as well. This is a problem that is too easily solved, yet no one is doing anything substantive about it. Makes you wonder why the ISPs tolerate it. Under the table bribes? There is something wrong here, as the solution is so simple, yet everyone seems baffled.....

[steve-b]

The only things that will stop the spammers is either eliminating email altogether or making the sender pay

True, but a punishment in proportion to the crime (e.g. imprisoning the spammer for a period equal to the total time it takes his victims to "just hit delete" -- figure about one second per spam e-mail) would get the problem down to a manageable size.

[taxcontrol]

I support SPAM - it is great fried and in a BLS (bacon, lettus, and spam) sandwitch.

As for the electronic variety, I would simply want all emails (solicited or not - and HTML pages as well) that sell a product to be required to use the tag ADV - for advertisement.

Porn email and sites should be required to have a tag as well. This would allow a firewall/filter to cut that junk out of my mail box with ease.

[Paleo Conservative]

Here's a web page from the Symantec site warning about unauthorized third party spam. They seem to be implying that these offers are not only unauthorized but also for pirated software.

Users should exercise caution in the following circumstances:

If the Web order form page of an online store is not a secure Web site.

If the URL refers to a Web page that does not include a recognizable retail outlet or legitimate reseller.

If the address of the Web order form page does not begin with "https://", and a locked padlock icon does not appear in yellow, or in a yellow box, on the bottom bar of your Web browser when visiting the order form page.

If a software offer seems "too good to be true" (Samples below).

If the bottom of the browser window is intentionally hidden.

If a promotion suggests a combination of one or more of the following sentences. Samples for online promotions NOT affiliated to Symantec

[Mamzelle]

The porn ads really annoy--a lot of them come with pictures. It's kind of a game to see if I can delete all the junk as fast as it gets listed in the mailbox. Some of it is sexual harassment, pure and simple.

[taxcontrol]

Here in Colorado, we have a "no call" list. Telemarketers are required to first check you number against that list. If they find a match, they are required to remove that number from their database.

I understand that in less than a year over 2 million people have subscribed to the "no call" list. In fact, it is so sucessfull, the pols are looking to expand the list to cover cell phone numbers as well.

[wewillnotfail]

Can I be first?

[Paleo Conservative]

The porn ads really annoy--a lot of them come with pictures.....

They are so indiscriminate that I am surprised porn vendors have not been hit with felony charges for sending indecent material to minors. There's no way these scum are not sending email to minors. I would like to see prosecutions occur in conservative jurisdictions, and some serious jail time awarded to the porn spammers.

[Paleo Conservative]

Here in Colorado, we have a "no call" list.

We have that in Texas too. I even got spam explaining how I could be taken off of telemarketers's phone lists.