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Understanding USA's Anti-Spam Law (CAN-SPAM)
Posted: May 14th, 2018
Unwanted Commercial Electronic Mail
The Commission has adopted rules to protect consumers and businesses from unwanted electronic mail messages on wireless devices such as mobile phones. The Commission began this rulemaking process as directed by Congress in the Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act of 2003 (CAN-SPAM Act). Congress passed the CAN-SPAM Act to address the rapid growth in unwanted commercial electronic mail messages.
The CAN-SPAM Act requires the Federal Communications Commission to issue rules with regard to commercial e-mail and some text messages sent to wireless devices such as cell phones—not e-mail in general. Specifically, section 14 of the CAN-SPAM Act requires the Commission to develop rules to protect consumers from “unwanted mobile service commercial messages.”
For information on stopping spam in general, not just messages for wireless devices, see the FTC’s website www.ftc.gov/spam/)
Stop Unwanted Calls and Texts
Unwanted calls, including robocalls and texts, are consistently among the top consumer complaints filed with the FCC each year. The FCC is committed to protecting consumers from unwanted telemarketing calls and text messages, and works closely with industry representatives to give consumers more control over the calls and texts they receive.
The Commission has tackled robocalls on as many fronts as possible, implementing new rules, ruling on questions raised about the law, taking enforcement action, keeping consumers informed, and encouraging new pro-consumer innovation by the private sector.
Steps for Preventing Robocalls
Robocalls are unsolicited prerecorded telemarketing calls to landline home telephones, and all autodialed or prerecorded calls or text messages to wireless numbers, emergency numbers, and patient rooms at health care facilities.
Latest FCC Action
The FCC recently adopted new rules to allow voice service providers to proactively block certain types of robocalls that are likely to be fraudulent because they come from certain types of phone numbers, including those that do not or cannot make outgoing calls. For example, perpetrators have used IRS phone numbers that don't dial out to impersonate the tax agency, informing the people who answer that they are calling to collect money owed to the U.S. government. Such calls appear to be legitimate to those who receive them and can result in fraud or identity theft. Service providers now can block such calls, as well as calls from invalid numbers, like those with area codes that don't exist, from numbers that have not been assigned to a provider, and from numbers allocated to a provider but not currently in use.
Article Sourced from the United States of America's FCC.