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Sifting Through the Sp@m "Solutions"
by Michael Mayor ©Copyright 2003

It's official. Fighting the war on Sp@m is now big business.
Anti-Sp@m and content filtering revenues alone are expected to
total more than $653 million this year, according to a study by
The Radicati Group Inc. It's also big politics. No less than 28
State Legislators have put their names on an anti-Sp@m Bill and
the Federal level is just getting started. Stopping Sp@m in its
tracks is the hottest issue to come along in many years and 
there are those that see it as their E ticket to profits or
pulling away at the polls. It's a bit ironic isn't it? In order
to stop the flood of Sp@m we must first wade through of flood of
proposed solutions. 

Here's my informal analysis on what has been proposed so far. 
In general, the anti-Sp@m solutions can be classified into 
two overall groups; legislation and technology. 

Legislation

I was fortunate enough to participate in the FTC's Sp@m Forum 
in Washington D.C. last week. Let me go on record by saying 
the industry should stand up and applaud their brave and 
thorough approach to this incredibly complex issue. As an 
e-mail marketer, I'm somewhat ashamed that the "Principal had 
to be called in to break up the schoolyard brawl", and that the
students couldn't settle the matter on their own. However, the
students were clearly getting beaten to a pulp so he was welcome
just the same. The FTC would have loved nothing more than
industry self-regulation, but we are beyond that now. I, for
one, am glad they're involved. That said, it should be noted
that there are at least two inherent flaws in the belief that 
state and/or federal anti-Sp@m legislation can provide a solution 
to the Sp@m epidemic in the United States: 

  * Much Sp@m originates from outside the United States 

  * Legislators are making a major assumption about reputable
    e-mail marketers when they think they have the list member's
    postal information. 

However, let's put that aside for now and look at the major 
elements contained within the Controlling the Assault of 
Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing (CAN-Sp@m) Act of 2003 
and New York Senator Charles Schumer's recent proposal (the two 
that seem to have the most legs): 

* "ADV" subject line requirement (Shumer) - The ADV law has been
 popular at the state level for some time now. Yet most industry
 insiders, including anti-Sp@m advocates, agree that adding "ADV"
 to the beginning of a subject line has absolutely zero effect on
 Sp@m. Sp@mmers may or may not include ADV, but reputable markers
 will be forced to, which makes all permission- based commercial
 correspondence "filter bait" at the very least. In my opinion,
 ADV laws are merely quick political plays for those politicians
 watching the Sp@m war from afar. On the other hand, the CAN-Sp@m
 Act does not require ADV but "clear and conspicuous
 identification" which goes further, in my opinion, without tying
 the creative hands of direct marketers. 

* Email Harvesting (Schumer) - Schumer should be commended for
 being one of the few in Washington to recognize how much of Sp@m
 is created. Email Harvesting, and all its related technology,
 should be outlawed - plain and simple. 

* National No-Sp@m list (Schumer) -- Schumer wants to spend
 $75,000,000 to create and enforce such a national do-not-email
 list. The trouble is Sp@mmers won't use it and reputable
 marketers must. Therefore, the permission that the reputable
 marker holds is meaningless until "cleared" with the Federal
 government. It will also increase campaign costs and turnaround
 time for the good guys. Score a big one for the Sp@mmers here. 

* Sender Accountabilty (CAN-Sp@m/Schumer) - This is the best
 ingredient in both bills, in my opinion. I'll support anything
 that penalizes the sender for falsifying header information,
 deceiving the consumer and/or having a missing or inactive
 unsubscribe option. 

Technology

Here, too, exist a couple of flaws in assuming technology holds
the key to stopping Sp@m: 

* Mass consensus is generally required among all ISPs, Email 
  Service Providers and trade organizations for it to be truly 
  effective 

* All technology is temporary. 

Nevertheless, tech solutions are gaining steam so let's review: 

* Sp@m Filters - I've lost count of how many filters there are
 now, both for personal and corporate use. At best, filters are
 imperfect tools and it's up to the user as to how much
 imperfection they are willing to live with. Until filters can
 block just those incoming e-mails that have fraudulent sender
 information and bad unsubscribe links, they are a size small
 Band-Aid on a very large wound. 

* Certification - Certification services act as the middleman
 between e-mail vendors and ISPs by ensuring their client rosters
 are upholding certain standards. ISPs then let the mail
 containing the certificate through. Habeas and TrustE are the
 best known of such services and the DMA has hinted that they may
 be developing one as well. However, each are susceptible to the
 two inherent tech flaws mentioned above (consensus is critical).
 Further, some invade on the advertiser's "real estate" by
 placing banners at the top of the message. What's more is that
 certification services typically have to lower the bar to get
 consensus among the e-mail vendors rather than raise it. 

* Project Lumos - Project Lumos is the Network Advertising
 Initiative's (NAI) blueprint for a technical architecture to
 eradicate Sp@m by enforcing sender accountability. While its
 details are still being discussed, it has broad tentative
 support from most e-mail service providers and ISPs. As with any
 "technical architecture" initiative, the key question of course
 is how much will it cost? 

So what are we left with? The Sp@m war now has another dimension
- the opportunists. Luckily, there are far more people out there
who sincerely wish to close the floodgates of unsolicited e-mail
because it hurts legitimate businesses. In my opinion, the key
to winning the war on Sp@m can be summed up by one word:
transparency. Sp@m has prevailed because unscrupulous people
have been able to hide behind their technology. Consumers can't
unsubscribe and authorities can't track the senders down. To
this end, I feel the CAN-Sp@m Act is a strong start as it makes
it a Federal crime to falsify and deceive via e-mail. I will
also watch with interest as the details of Lumos get fleshed
out. Technology that enforces accountability cannot be a bad
thing. 

Mind you, I feel transparency is critical for all parties
involved, which means those operating blacklists and ISPs as
well. It's time for all parties to come out of the shadows.
Those that don't should be penalized. 

================================================================
As President and Chief Operating Officer of NetCreations/ 
PostMasterDirect, Michael Mayor is an 18-year veteran of direct 
marketing and a recognized pioneer of e-mail marketing. Michael 
joined NetCreation's as one of the company's first employees in 
1998 and played a key role in helping to build the largest and 
most successful e-mail list management company in the industry 
today. He has also pioneered many of the e-mail marketing 
industry's standards and best practices. Mayor is a leading 
advocate of privacy and is a frequent speaker at industry 
functions. Mayor is also the Chairman for the Interactive 
Advertising Bureau's Email Committee.
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