I propose that the [WLUG] makes a submission to the government about [Spam] legislation. To contribute, edit this page with your comments. While I don't think laws alone are going to stop spam, they a certainly a powerful tool against spammers and should be encouraged. 

  

 The request is available online: http://www.med.govt.nz/pbt/infotech/spam/ __PLEASE__ read this before commenting on the questions below. The document is ''very'' well written and discusses the various issues. 

 zcat(1): My kids (7 and 9) would like to be able to exchange email with their friends at school, email stuff to kids TV, enter competitions, etc. I've set them up their own email addresses, but I see today they're starting to get viruses and I have no doubt that spam (much of it highly pornographic) will soon follow. Now I have to discreetly pre-screen their mail. 

  

 MatthiasDallmeier: Yes, it wastes my time and money. (By the way, the original meaning of "spam" is not really the same as junk e-mail, so we should probably not use that word.) 

  

 !! 2. Do you think legislation has a role to play alongside other complementary measures? 

  

 PerryLorier: Yes. There are several promising technological solutions on the horizon such as [SPF], [CallerID], [Penny Black|http://research.microsoft.com/research/sv/PennyBlack/], however even if these are effective at wiping out email spam, there is still other types of spam, such as IM spam. 

  

  

 OliverJones: I do not agree. One should be able to be anonymous. But anonymous and bulk probably shouldn't go together. Also there are problems when it comes to computer generated emails. How do you identify them? 

  

 MatthewBrowne: I do not see why any "commercial" email should be anonymous. 

  

 !! 14. Should there be a requirement for commercial electronic messages to include a statement to the effect that the recipient may use an electronic address set out in the message to send an unsubscribe message to the sender, and to ensure that such electronic address is functional? 

  

 JohnMcPherson: In practise, this doesn't work, because unethical people (such as those who spam) merely use such responses to confirm that their message was actually read by a human, and so that sender's valid address is of a higher "quality" compared to an address of unknown status. 

  

 MatthewBrowne: If we have used the double opt-in system to receive these messages then yes, an unsubscribe message would be useful. In all other cases I'd agree with what John said above. 

  

 !! 15. Should there be a requirement that commercial electronic messages provide accurate header and subject information? 

  

 PerryLorier: Yes. 

  

 JohnMcPherson: Yes. Legitimate headers allows end users, system administrators, and ultimately law enforcement to contact, or at least discover, the origin of the message. Whether such a requirement could be enforced is another matter, or course. 

  

 OliverJones: Mail should have acurate and true headers. However this defeats anonomity. 

  

 !! 16. Should there be a requirement for the labelling of advertising or adult messages? 

  

 PerryLorier: Adult material should be labelled obviously as such and should be labeled in a way that can be detected by software for filtering purposes for younger children. 

 zcat(1): This shouldn't be necessesary. My children should not be recieving anything that they didn't explicitly subscribe to. I'm fairly sure they didn't sign up anywhere for hot oral sex and penis-enlargement emails, so I shouldn't HAVE to filter those out. 

  

 MatthiasDallmeier: I would tend to agree with Bruce on that one. Without UCE this is not an issue and such a requirement would only confuse matters. There might or might not be a need for such a requirement independent of anti-spam legislation and not limited to e-mail only though. 

  

  

 OliverJones: I agree with John. Pornographic content on the internet should be covered by the same laws that cover ponography in print. 

  

 !! 17. Should anti-spam legislation include rules against the supply, acquisition and use of address-harvesting software and harvested-address lists in connection with the unlawful sending of electronic messages? 

  

 PerryLorier: Yes. Publishing an email address on a website should not be an open invitation to email it with things that are unrelated to the page that it was posted on. 

  

 OliverJones: Matthias, that is unworkable. What if I get asked by a friend what another friend's email address is. Is it illegal for me to give him that address? I think that's pretty draconian. Email addresses should be treated just like phone numbers. Phone numbers get printed in a big book that you can easily acquire. This is highly useful and Internet users should have confidence that publishing their contact details does not result in "unsolicited unwanted" contact. However "unsolicited wanted" contacted should not be excluded. However I do think that the act of harvesting addresses in connection with breaking another law should probably be covered by legislation. However it would need to be fairly specific so as to avoid other legitimate reasons for collecting email addresses. Eg, creating a "whitepages" for email. 

  

 MatthewBrowne: I don't think you guys have read the question. I most definitely disagree that any software should be illegal to use. DeCSS anyone? 

  

 !! 18. Who should be able to bring an action against an alleged spammer? 

  

 MatthiasDallmeier: Anyone who is actually affected by their action.