ACCC to strangle spammers - News - Communications

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This story was printed from ZDNet Australia.
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ACCC to strangle spammers

By Staff writers, ZDNet Australia
May 20, 2003
URL: http://www.zdnet.com.au/news/communications/soa/ACCC-to-strangle-spammers/0,130061791,120274675,00.htm

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) is being "proactive" in the international fight to put a stranglehold on spam, according to Acting Chairman Sitesh Bhojani.

As previously reported in ZDNet Australia the ACCC has joined forces with law enforcement agencies from the USA, Japan, Chile and Canada in sending letters to the operators of 1,000 'open ports' across the world, asking them to close the ports down.

"We are concerned that spam can be an elusive issue, and we are determined to work in close cooperation with other domestic and international government agencies to ensure it does not fall through the cracks," said Bhojani.

"The problem with spam is not confined to its contents," said Bhojani. "There are also questions about its very nature, and whether restrictions of some sort would be widely applauded from all quarters."

One man became so annoyed with the level of spam he was receiving he spent several hours researching spam from a Victorian business and proving it had breached the Fair Trading Act by the claims made in its spam.

The ACCC has cooperative relationships with consumer protection law enforcement agencies in 31 countries through the International Consumer Protection and Enforcement Network, and also has a Cooperation Agreement on consumer protection with the US Federal Trade Commission.

The US Federal Trade Commission has recently completed major studies on spam and found that:

86 percent of e-mail addresses that are published on the Web are 'harvested' by spammers, and receive unwanted junk e-mail
63 percent of 'remove me from your list' requests are not honoured
66 percent of spam messages have falsified information in the 'from' or 'subject' headings or in the text of the e-mail

The ACCC has offered the following advice to consumers wishing to reduce their exposure to spam:

ask your ISP or IT provider about spam filtering software
never open e-mail from people you have not heard of
never respond to unsolicited e-mails, even to 'unsubscribe'
if the e-mail contains a breach of the Trade Practices Act 1974, keep it while you report it to the ACCC on 1300 302 502, then