Vendors spamming NANOG attendees

Wed Jun 14 02:34:50 UTC 2017

Mark,

What law makes the harvesting of email addresses illegal? None that I know of. 

-mel via cell

> On Jun 13, 2017, at 6:58 PM, Mark Andrews <marka at isc.org> wrote:
> 
> 
> In message <F7E1F127-E971-4E92-AF44-13193BD0E27F at beckman.org>, Mel Beckman writes:
>> Mark,
>> 
>> The problem with your idea is that these NANOG attendee emails aren't
>> illegal under CAN-SPAM. This toothless Act let's anyone email any address
>> they want, however obtained, with virtually any content (except sexually
>> explicit), as long as they don't use misleading headers, deceptive
>> subject lines, or obscure the fact that the email is an ad. Those
>> features, plus clear identification of the originator and an opt-out
>> mechanism, let anyone send unlimited spam.
> 
> The act of harvesting the email addresses is illegal which makes
> the subsequent emails illegal even if they meet all the other
> requirements of the CAN-SPAM act.
> 
>> So, in reality, these so-called NANOG spammers are within the law. We
>> just don't like what they're doing.
>> 
>> We definitely can't sue them as you advise. In fact, individual CANT use
>> under CAN-SPAM. Only we network operators can.
>> 
>> Thanks for nothing, Congress.
> 
> As someone with stonger local anti-spam legislation that has to put
> up with the spam from US sources I have to agree.
> 
> Mark
> 
>> -mel via cell
>> 
>>> On Jun 13, 2017, at 5:10 PM, Mark Andrews <marka at isc.org> wrote:
>>> 
>>> 
>>> In message <38E506A8-247A-478F-9C4D-21602BEE6028 at beckman.org>, Mel
>> Beckman writes:
>>>> That still leaves the question: how to you invoke this financial
>>>> punishment? Prohibit NANOG members from buying their products?
>>> 
>>> Everyone that has received the email bring a action under the
>>> CAN-SPAM act.  Really if you don't want the list to be harvested,
>>> which is illegal under the act, bring the action.  Opt out doesn't
>>> save the sender if they have already committed a illegal act.
>>> 
>>> Mark
>>> 
>>>> -mel via cell
>>>> 
>>>>>> On Jun 13, 2017, at 10:12 AM, Rich Kulawiec <rsk at gsp.org> wrote:
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> On Tue, Jun 13, 2017 at 03:31:46PM +0000, Mel Beckman wrote:
>>>>>> Sometimes they're ignorant and don't realize they're spamming.
>>>>> 
>>>>> That excuse stopped being viable sometime in the last century.  They
>>>> know
>>>>> exactly what they're doing, they're just counting on the prospective
>>>>> gains to outweigh the prospective losses.  If they're right, then the
>>>>> spamming will not only continue, it will increase.  (As we've seen:
>>>>> over and over and over again.)  That's because they don't care about
>>>>> being professional or responsible or ethical: they only care about
>>>> profits.
>>>>> 
>>>>> So the choice is clear: either make it plain to such "people" (if I
>>>>> may dignify sociopathic filth with that term) that this is absolutely
>>>>> unacceptable and that it will have serious, immediate, ongoing
>> negative
>>>>> financial consequences, or do nothing while the problem escalates
>>>>> indefinitely.
>>>>> 
>>>>>  If you give people the means to hurt you, and they do it, and
>>>>>  you take no action except to continue giving them the means to
>>>>>  hurt you, and they take no action except to keep hurting you,
>>>>>  then one of the ways you can describe the situation is "it isn't
>>>>>  scaling well".
>>>>>      --- Paul Vixie, on NANOG
>>>>> 
>>>>> ---rsk
>>> 
>>> --
>>> Mark Andrews, ISC
>>> 1 Seymour St., Dundas Valley, NSW 2117, Australia
>>> PHONE: +61 2 9871 4742                 INTERNET: marka at isc.org
> 
> -- 
> Mark Andrews, ISC
> 1 Seymour St., Dundas Valley, NSW 2117, Australia
> PHONE: +61 2 9871 4742                 INTERNET: marka at isc.org