The surprise passage of a pro-junk email provision by the US Senate earlier this month has many in the antispam community seeing red. As a result, many Web surfers will be seeing pink.
In an act of protest, outraged netizens are turning their Web pages pink – specifically, a particularly lurid shade reminiscent of ... Spam.
On 12 May, Senator Frank Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Robert Torricelli (D-New Jersey) introduced a rider to the popular Consumer Anti-Slamming Act, despite Murkowski's earlier announcement that public hearings on unsolicited email would be held in mid-June. The bill passed 99-0, and has been sent to the House of Representatives.
In contrast to the anti-slam bill, which protects consumers by outlawing the practice of switching long-distance providers without their knowledge, the Murkowski/Torricelli rider is largely viewed by the Internet community as anti-consumer and pro-spam.
According to Murkowski's Web site, the provision "requires junk emailers to identify themselves and honor remove requests." The rider would require recipients of unwanted commercial email to "opt out" of each advertiser's mailing list – an overwhelming task if even 1 percent of the 20 million small businesses in America chose to send out unsolicited bulk email. Each individual would have to request removal from 200,000 mailing lists.
Critics say that's a fatal flaw, and charge that rather than curtailing the flow of unsolicited commercial email, the bill promotes it.
"[The rider] legitimizes the idea that someone can make the recipient pay for someone else's advertising," says Mickey Chandler, a Texan paralegal and president of the Forum for Responsible and Ethical Email (FREE), which is sponsoring the Pink Pages Project. "If this amendment becomes law, it could make electronic mail virtually useless."
"The Great American Pink-Out" begins officially on Monday and will last until June 13. However, some participants have already turned their sites pink and plan to keep them that way until the amendment is defeated or the anti-spam Smith Bill is passed. Also known as the Netizen's Protection Act of 1997, the Smith Bill is modeled on the 1991 law that made junk faxes illegal.
"Personally, I think the color is hideous," said Chandler, "but we want people to be shocked by that color, and be curious enough to learn more about this bill and what it allows. The real purpose is to educate people and motivate them to do something about it – like contact their Congressmen and -women."
But in the contentious world of spam-fighting, the anti-spam community is not solidly behind the Pink Pages Project. The Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial Email has urged its members to write their congressional representatives, but declined to support the protest.
And at least one vehement anti-spammer dismisses it as "ridiculous." Ron Schwarz, a software developer and author, has announced his own, "more pro-active" plan to protest the legislation. In the event of the amendment's passage, Schwarz vows to release a software program called the "Pandora Project" as freeware. The program will allow recipients of spam to automatically bounce emails back at all known employees and officers of the company that sent the original unwanted advertisement.
"Pandora capitalizes on the quirks or loopholes in the Murkowski rider, which evidently was designed to benefit the Direct Marketing Association's members who want to send unsolicited bulk email," explained Schwarz. "But by creating a law like that, they're opening Pandora's box because [ email is ] a two-way street."
Chandler views the Pandora Project plan with alarm. "Net abuse is not an appropriate response to Net abuse," he said. "That would exponentially increase each and every spam that is sent out. I can see mail servers around the world crashing as a result of this."
Schwarz stresses that his Pandora Project is meant to be a deterrent. "My goal is to have the supporters of this bill read [about my project] and drop their jaws as they realize that this is possible and perfectly legal," he said. "Then switch to support the Smith Bill – the good bill."
