Anti-Spam Legislation In Effect

MikeyMars writes "CNN is reporting that the FCC has put out a list of domain names that could potentially be fined $11,000 dollars if they continue to send unsolicited text messages to cell phone users."

misleading

[over_exposed]

They could be fined $11,000 per offense, not total.

Re:misleading

[CrackerJack9]

mod article +5 Informative!

I guess not everyone read "per violation" as "per illegal email" or "per offense" (i.e. per violation of the law to which TFA is referring).

If you were clearifying the text above, well...I couldn't find the where it said total at all

I guess I'm still having rendering problems

Not sure if I'm reading this right...

[Atlantis-Rising]

But those look like cellular providers to me. They're going to start fining the providers for spam sent by their consumers? And if they aren't providers, Are they all hosted in the US? Or will they be, once the FCC starts cracking down?

Re:Not sure if I'm reading this right...

[mschaffer]

That's how I read the article. I hope that is not what it means.

Re:Not sure if I'm reading this right...

[walt-sjc]

I read it the same way. My guess is that the reporter got it backwards. Sending SMS spam TO those domains should be a fine of $11K.

Good cause

[IBeatUpNerds]

I agree that unsolicited text messages are annoying as hell. That's why I disabled text messages from all users except those I specified. This is using verizon. Sure, it'd be great if companies/advertisers/evil spammers stopped sending that crap all together, but in the mean time, you might as well just disable it if you can.

It's not like that 11,000 a pop is going for a good cause, anyhow...

Re:Good cause

[MerryGoByeBye]

What kind of a bizarre tag is that? The point of fining someone in a legal system is to enforce the rule of law, not to get free dough for worthwhile causes.

Re:Good cause

[gregmac]

It's not like that 11,000 a pop is going for a good cause, anyhow...

Who cares? The point is, it's coming FROM a BAD cause.

Plus, it makes it worthwhile from the perspective that a bunch of people spent a bunch of time on taxpayer dollars towards coming up with and enforcing these rules -- now that money is getting paid back, and then some.

unclear

[darthpenguin]

The article is rather unclear. The main paragraph is:

The Federal Communications Commission on Monday published a list of domain names to which telemarketers may not send e-mail without permission from cell phone subscribers.

So, this would make it illegal for people to spam [e-mail] (or whatever), it appears, which makes a lot of sense, as many cellular providers are on that list of domains.

Then it goes on to say "The Federal Communications Commission on Monday published a list of domain names to which telemarketers may not send e-mail without permission from cell phone subscribers.", which implies that cingular.com (as well as all the other listed sites are the ones doing the spamming. So, which is it?

Re:unclear

[darthpenguin]

Bleh, I messed up, even after previewing. The second quote should be: Sites on the list have 30 days to stop transmitting unwanted e-mail messages, unless the recipient has given permission to receive the message.

Re:unclear

[CrackerJack9]

Well, scratch the first part. But I think the rest of my explanation still makes sense. Sorry about that. And since they can't possibly expect to keep track of who the subscribers are giving permission to, I'd assume you will have to give permission to allow all spam to you (since they would not be able to properly filter it) if your consent is given for some. But perhaps that's still a bit optimistic of me...

Re:unclear

[CrackerJack9]

Your post is unclear to me.
You quote the same exact phrase (in italics) but have trouble understanding it one time and not the other.

Please understand the phrase, "to which telemarketers". The listed domains are not the ones sending the e-mail, they are the ones TO WHICH it is being illicitly (illegally) sent TO. If you continue past the headline and RTFA, you'll see it seems as though the listed domains will be held responsible for allowing the e-mails to be transmitted (think pass through). I believe th

Re:unclear

[bigsteve@dstc]

I went to the FCC website to find out. It is clear that this is a list of domains to which SPAM must not be sent. http://www.fcc.gov/cgb/policy/DomainNameDownload.h tml

What's going on AND Hotmail Spammers

[Refrozen]

This thread is moving VERY slowly, what's going on /.? Anyways, I believe this is a good thing, however, I don't see HOTMAIL on that list. :-) I honestly believe free mail providers should be 100% responsible for what their users do so they'd so something to stop the ub3rsp4m that comes out of HMail.

Brilliant, txt format! update your hosts file!!111

[tod_miller]

Just copy and past into your hosts file and replace '02-07-2005^' with '127.0.0.1 '

If everyone did that, then... well... yey! bye bye spammers, off the face of DNS.

Re:Brilliant, txt format! update your hosts file!!

[bryhhh]

Good idea, but I don't think my mobile phone has a hosts file.

Re:List has high count of SMS messaging systems

[CrackerJack9]

That's the point, the FCC is making it bad ($11,000 fine) for people to spam people's phones (phonenumber@). I can only assume that is why this list is so heavy with domains that offer SMS.

I'm beginning to understand why this list is moving so slowly...

you have it totally wrong.

[Ajmuller]

the list of domain names is a list of domains that spammers can't send email to not a list of spammer domain names. Look at this [fcc.gov].
If spammers send email TO these domains they will get fined 11k, not if they send them from those domains.
Blah, yet another story slashdot mangled, does noone proofread stories before they go out, or are all the moderators too busy tripping over each other to get the moderator equivlent of "first post".

Lets clear this up

[Facekhan]

This is a list of domain names whose email addresses are actually cell phones. Emails sent to those domains become text msgs on people's phones. Its illegal to spam txt msgs at least in part because you pay to recieve them.

I have yet to recieve a spam text message and I have had a verizon txt account for a few years now.

The FTC is basically making a do-not-spam list to protect email linked txt message systems on mobile phone provider networks.

Frankly, the scum that would actually spam someone's phone deserve to be tracked down and executed.

Spam, one more reason to hate Floridians.