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The Definition of SPAM
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The word "Spam" as applied to
Email means Unsolicited Bulk Email ("UBE").
Unsolicited means that the Recipient has not granted
verifiable permission for the message to be sent. Bulk means that the
message is sent as part of a larger collection of messages, all having
substantively identical content. |
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A message is Spam only if it is
both Unsolicited
and
Bulk.
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Unsolicited Email is normal
email
(examples: first contact enquiries, job enquiries,
sales enquiries) |
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Bulk Email is normal email
(examples: subscriber newsletters, customer
communications, discussion lists) |
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Technical Definition of Spam
An electronic message is "spam" IF:
(1) |
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the recipient's personal
identity and context are irrelevant because the message is equally
applicable to many other potential recipients;
AND |
(2) |
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the recipient has not verifiably granted deliberate, explicit, and
still-revocable permission for it to be sent. |
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Spam is an issue about consent,
not content. Whether the UBE message is an advert, a scam, porn, a begging
letter or an offer of a free lunch, the content is irrelevant - if the
message was sent unsolicited and in bulk then the message is spam.
Spam is not a sub-set of UBE, it is not "UBE that is
also a scam or that doesn't contain an unsubscribe link", all email sent
unsolicited and in bulk is Spam.
This distinction is important because legislators
spend inordinate amounts of time attempting to regulate the content of
spam messages, and in doing so come up against free speech issues, without
realizing that the spam issue is solely about the delivery method. |
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Important facts relating to
this definition:
(1) the sending of Unsolicited Bulk Email ("UBE") is
banned by the vast majority of Internet service providers worldwide.
(2) Spamhaus' anti-spam blocklist, used by more than
260 million Internet users to reject emails identified as spam, is based
on the internationally-accepted definition of Spam as "Unsolicited Bulk
Email". Therefore anyone sending UBE on the Internet, whether the content
is commercial or not, illegal or not, needs to be fully aware that (1)
they will lose their Internet access if they send UBE, (2) they will be
placed on the Spamhaus Block List (SBL)
if they send UBE. |
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Various jurisdictions have
implemented legislation to control what they call "spam". One particular
example is US S.877 (CANSPAM 2004). Each law addresses "spam" in different
ways, and as a consequence, often has different definitions of what they
cover, whether they call it "spam" or not. Spamhaus uses the industry
standard "unsolicited bulk email" definition which underlines "it's not
about content, it's about consent". As such, arguments as to whether UBE
messages are covered under CANSPAM or are compliant with CANSPAM, are
entirely irrelevant. |
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Other Reference Documents
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