Legal Question in Technology Law in California
Can Spam Act of 2003
I have a quesition regarding the Can Spam Act of 2003. Here is the hypothetical situation. An individual has a personal account that is used to send emails promoting Romania to random email addresses. The email addresses are created by randomly trying different combinations of the persons first name and last name along with the companys web address. The email does not sell anything. It simply says Romania is great. If the email does not bounce back, the individual records the email as successful. The successful email address is then given to a company which includes the email in a profile that is sold to other companies. The individual is an employee of the company, but uses a separate personal email account for the entire process before giving the email address to the company. In any part of the situation, is there a violation of the Can Spam Act of 2003?
Secondly, if the company does not include the email in a profile, but instead sends a separate solicitation email for the business, is there a volation of the Can Spam Act of 2003?
2 Answers from Attorneys
Re: Can Spam Act of 2003
I think you know the answer to this. If the activity were completely legal and aboveboard, then why wouldn't the company do it from its own computers instead of having an employee do it from a personal account?
If a company is going to use email advertising, it must comply with CAN-SPAM, with state laws for every state to which the advertisements go, and with the terms of the agreement with the ISP that is being used to send the email messages.
Re: Can Spam Act of 2003
In California you should also see Business and Professions Code section 17529.5 which is of more concern in the situation you described. Our website contains additional information.
Jeffrey A. Cohen
InternetLitigators