Georgia Enacts "Slam Spam" Act

Georgia's Governor has just signed the Georgia Slam Spam E-Mail Act into law. It puts some pretty tight regulations on commercial email. As with most laws, it defines spam as junk emails that are somehow misleading.

In certain situations - sending spam can in fact constitute a felony:

1. Sending over 10,000 pieces of spam in a single day

2. If the spam campaign generates over $1000 from an individual unwanted email, or if it makes over $50k from spam sent via any given service provider

3. If the spammer utilizes the services of a minor to send the unwanted email

In felony spam cases, the sender can get fined up to $50k, and possibly get up to 5 years behind bars. For lesser cases, offenders can get hit with a thousand dollar fine and up to a year in jail.

The act doesn't bar all mail spam. "Legitimate" commercial email is not regulated by the act.

So far spammers have generally ignored such legislation. Even acts that have light regulations with tough penalties have not been complied with. The installation of a spam mail stopper such as SpamButcher still seems to be the way to most effectively block e-mails that are unwanted.

Back