Contact:
Jason Catlett, Junkbusters Corp., (908) 753-7861
John Mozena, CAUCE, (810) 939-4660 x242
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Washington, January 10, 2000-- Consumer advocates and opponents of unsolicited commercial e-mail (a.k.a. "spam") called upon Internet users around the world to reject the "Electronic Mail Preference Service (e-MPS)," scheduled for launch today by the Direct Marketing Association (DMA).
"Any company that looks to the DMA's e-mail policies for guidance and relies upon the e-MPS for cover can look forward to being labeled a spammer, shunned by the world's Internet service providers, and maybe even sued," said Scott Hazen Mueller, Chairman of the Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial Email (CAUCE).
The DMA claims that the e-MPS will create a universal 'don't send me unsolicited e-mail' list. However there is no requirement that DMA member companies ever utilize the e-MPS before sending unsolicited e-mail.
"In over two years of CAUCE's existence, we have yet to see a single spammer claim to be a member of the DMA," said John Levine, author of the best-selling book "Internet for Dummies" and board member of CAUCE. "This means that the e-MPS will have no effect on existing junk mailers who won't use e-MPS, while perversely encouraging DMA members who don't send junk e-mail now to start spamming in the future."
"The e-MPS is rooted in the idea that marketers have a right to flood the e-mail accounts of consumers and that it is a consumer's responsibility to beg for relief," added Mueller. "We call upon consumers to reject the DMA's cynical attempt to say 'if you get spammed, it's your problem.' Because the cost of email service is ultimately greater to recipients than to senders, the DMA's position amounts to an endorsement of more than nuisance - it's an endorsement of theft."
The DMA says the e-MPS is part of the industry's effort to work in harmony with Internet culture. However opponents point to a pattern in which recommendations from the Internet community have rejected. Previously the DMA has issued "Unsolicited Marketing E-Mail" guidelines for marketers which encourage e-mail marketers to engage in activities that violate the Acceptable Use Policies of virtually every Internet Service Provider in the United States.
"By ignoring the advice of experienced Internet marketing gurus and consumer advocates, the Direct Marketing Association is giving us an e-mail preference service which is an insult to both consumers and their Internet providers, and imperils any DMA member who thinks that this service somehow makes their intrusive marketing methods acceptable," added J.D. Falk, at-large board member of the Internet Service Providers' Consortium and co-founder of CAUCE.
Nick Nicholas, Executive Director of the Mail Abuse Prevention System LLC (MAPS), one of a group of Internet experts who met with senior DMA officials to discuss the flaws in the e-MPS, says that marketers who rely on the DMA's guidelines could find themselves added to the Realtime Blackhole List (RBL) operated by MAPS. "Service providers and private corporations around the globe use the RBL to shun e-mail from known spam sites. The DMA's guidelines talk about deference to the 'rules of the forum.' However, they ignore the fact that the 'opt-in' approach is generally accepted by the Internet community as the standard for e-mail marketing. By violating the rules of the forum, advertisers employing these tactics will quickly find themselves isolated by the rest of the Internet community."
European Direct Marketing Associations are to provide gateways to the e-MPS scheme in an attempt to meet consumer-protection requirements provided for in European Union directives. "Since no one will be actually required to use it, this scheme will have little or no effect on the amount of spam European Internet users receive," said George Mills, Chair of EuroCAUCE. "Unsolicited commercial e-mail hits many users in Europe even harder because most users access the Internet via metered phone connections."
"If a company thinks that using the e-MPS will protect it from liability from anti-spam laws, they'd better speak to an attorney first," added Tom Geller, operator of the consumer resource web site Suespammers.org. "Fourteen U.S. states have laws regulating unsolicited commercial e-mail, with penalties up to $50 per e-mail or $25,000 per day," Geller explained.
"As a 15 year member of the DMA, I am convinced that they understand the problems created by spam and have deliberately chosen to ignore them," said Rodney Joffe, a direct marketing industry veteran and former executive of GTE Internetworking. "They have decided to mislead their membership into believing their e-mail marketing principles are acceptable to the Internet community. DMA members need to know that the DMA is dead wrong on spam."
One particular point of contention for the e-MPS has been the DMA's refusal to allow Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to register their customers' unwillingness to receive spam. In 1998, Joffe created SAFEeps (http://www.safeeps.com), an opt-out list preference service, designed according to recommendations of the Internet community. SAFEeps includes the ability for both individuals and ISPs to opt-out from receiving marketing e-mail. Despite endorsement by anti-spam groups, strong support from ISPs, and registration by thousands of individuals, spammers have refused to utilize SAFEeps's list cleaning abilities proving that something more than industry self-regulation is needed to protect consumers from spam.
Jason Catlett, President of Junkbusters Corp., contrasted the DMA's position with its sister organization, the Canadian Marketing Association, which since 1997 has prohibited its members from sending unsolicited commercial email. "Most businesses and industry groups have long understood that spamming is bad for consumers, bad for the Internet, and bad for business. The e-MPS from the DMA is a really rotten idea, as awful as a trade association of oil companies maintaining a list of people who don't want petroleum waste dumped near their property. It just shouldn't happen. People shouldn't register, and companies shouldn't use it."
About CAUCE
CAUCE is the world's largest Internet-based advocacy organization, with more than 20,000 members across the United States, and affiliates in Europe and Australia. It supports and works toward passage of legislation prohibiting unsolicited e-mail advertisements. CAUCE has no budget, no office and is run by an all-volunteer board using donated resources. For more information about CAUCE, visit its Web site at http://www.cauce.org.
About Suespammers.org
Suespammers.org ("The Suespammers Project") helps consumers and Internet service providers recover from damages caused by e-mail vandalism, or "spam". It has three mandates: to inform the public about relevant laws, to offer resources for prosecution, and to provide a forum for those currently pursuing or considering legal action. The Project's Web site and mailing list is at http://www.suespammers.org.
About MAPS
The Mail Abuse Prevention System is a California nonprofit company whose goal is to stop the Internet's e-mail system from being abused by spammers. MAPS offers a variety of services oriented towards those responsible for managing electronic mail systems in corporate IT departments, Internet service providers and educational institutions. For more information about MAPS, visit http://www.mail-abuse.org.
About Junkbusters
Junkbusters Corp. helps people get rid of junk messages of all kinds: spam, telemarketing calls, unwanted junk mail, junk faxes, and more. Its web site is a leading consumer resource on the control of junk communications. For more information about Junkbusters, visit http://www.junkbusters.com
This document is http://www.junkbusters.com/ht/en/nr32.html