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Spam Government The Courts News

Australian Spam Laws Working? 20

smash writes "According to AustralianIT, recent spam laws, including fines of up to 1.1 million dollars per day has seen a reduction in local spam production. This has been confirmed by SpamHaus. Surely people in other countries are just as ticked off with the problem - perhaps this is an example to follow?"
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Australian Spam Laws Working?

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  • The main problem with laws in this area is when legitimate e-maillers are threatened. With the no-call list here in the state I have delt with a number of companies that have to jump through hoops just to call me on the phone.
    • If you contacted the company then the do-not-call list does not apply. If you never contacted the company then why the hell should they call you?

      Remembering the story about the spam-lover a few months ago you might of course be someone who likes to be called by sales-drones but more likely you are just a person who like to cold-call people themselves and want to make it appear that this is in demand.

      So give a concrete example were you where a business you wanted to call you couldn't because of the no-call

      • . . . more likely you are just a person who like to cold-call people themselves and want to make it appear that this is in demand.

        Don't get me wrong, I hate cold-calls, and I really don't have much compassion for those who make them.

        Let me explain.. No, there is too much; let me sum up. There is this company that I do business with that offers this promotional package to our friends (Dinner for two and a $50 Best Buy gift card) to see if they are interested in doing business with them too. I alwa

        • There is this company that I do business with that offers this promotional package to our friends (Dinner for two and a $50 Best Buy gift card) to see if they are interested in doing business with them too. I always explain to my friends all about it before introducing them, since I don't want them to be blind sided. I tell them what they are selling, how much it costs, etc. Then if they are still interested I introduce them.

          Why don't they set up an 800 number so you can tell your friends 'just call thi

        • Personally I call your examples examples of unwanted advertising. It is a bit to close to those "welcome cards" you get when you moved house or similar stuff around child births or leaving school. STOP BUGGING ME ALREADY

          Then again I just don't like advertising at all, kinda suffering from an allergic reaction after an overdose.

          And that is really what has happened. So much unwanted advertising has appeared with so few obeying even the simplest of rules that now though laws have to be enforced. We only have

          • The company you described as being responsible has become the victim of the countless of bad companies. Sad but there are worse things.

            While the example of the company I gave is not a very big deal, the overall principle is we are continuing to trade freedoms for a sense of safety. The Patriot Act is just another example in a long stream of traded freedoms. Just like speed limits. We decide as a group of people that we are unable to make safe and intelligent decisions ourselves so we allow a govern

  • Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Tuesday July 27, 2004 @12:34PM (#9812841)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • Everytime some country proposes to introduce laws on spam you get a lot of idiots claiming that it will make no difference since everyone knows all spam comes from abroad or zombie machines. Guess this will shut them up once and for all eh? Why yes, I do believe in Santa Claus why do you ask?
  • Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Tuesday July 27, 2004 @12:49PM (#9813010)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • by ptaff ( 165113 ) on Tuesday July 27, 2004 @03:21PM (#9814776) Homepage
    <ms:Bashing>
    A couple of days ago an article proposed that 80% of spam comes from Microsoft-infected machines [slashdot.org]. So at most, 20% could be eliminated by these laws.

    So, should the Aussies really want to prevent spam and so something about it, the way is obvious.
    </ms:Bashing>

    • Some more realistic numbers:

      100% of spam comes from spammers, so at most 100% of spam could be eliminated in this way. The reason why spam happens is because it's profitable. It's because someone is selling something and paying the spammer to advertise it. It doesn't just randomly spawn from infected hosts.

      I agree that it is interesting how spam is being distributed currently, but that's just because it's the easiest way. While I agree that eliminating insecure Windows machines is a desirable goal, the fa
  • Look -- I work in the internet marketing business, (not a spam company) and I know exactly what will stop them:

    When California Bill SB-186 was proposed, it looked like it would pass. This scared the snot out of so many spammers that companies even in other states began to up and cease operations -- sell their lists, ramp-up delivery one last time, and just get out of the business. What SB-186 did was it made it legal to sue the Advertisers buying the spam marketing to begin with. If all of the spammers
  • ...not noticblyless spam in my inbox...

  • I would say that more likely the cause of Australian SPAM dropping off is that BigPond turned off access to port 25 - all mail MUST go out via their mail servers. This would certainly stop a large number of zombies and spammers in their tracks (BigPond was always getting in trouble for the volume of SPAM it produced).

    Of course, it's also pissed off some of the staff at my office who can no longer use our mail server while they're out and about (at least until I get the non-port 25 authenticated system runn
  • Wayne Fucking Mansfield.
    aka T3 Marketting
    aka Business Services Australia.

    As far as I know, this guy only sent his crap to Australian (.au) email addresses, but by God he was a pain in the arse.

    He flogs "How to be a winner" type management seminars, but at one point I was getting a dozen messages from him a day. I (and several hundred, if not thousand other poeple) reported him to the Anti-spam group and, in my case at least, the Spam has stopped.

    This guy honestly believes that what he is doing is legitim
  • given that the fine is 1.1 million dollars, I presume that we are considering a 1 million dollar fine plus 10% G.S.T.?

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