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Company Uses Copyright and Trademark Laws to Fight Spam
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posted by justfred
on Wednesday August 21, @10:15AM
from the habeas-spamus dept.
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(Reuters) Habeas Inc., of Palo Alto, California, plans to fight e-mail spam using a new system that relies on U.S. copyright and trademark law.
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The Habeas Sender Warranted Email service allows people and organizations to certify that e-mails they send are not spam by embedding a special, universal mark into the header. The mark is invisible to most recipients, but can be read by those who know how to get access to the hidden portions of headers. It contains a three-line haiku protected by copyright law, while six other lines contain the copyright and trademark notices and other trademark protected information.
Senders using the mark are verifying that the e-mail meets one of the following criteria: the e-mail is sent to only one recipient; the sender has verified permission from each recipient; the sender and each recipient share a pre-existing professional relationship; each recipient is a friend or family member of the sender and the e-mail is not commercial. Recipients can then prioritize or filter their email by separating Habeas mail from non-Habeas mail. Additionally, if senders using the mark fail to meet the criteria, they could be sued for trademark and copyright infringement.
Individuals and Internet service providers can license and use the mark for free, while businesses and bulk e-mail companies will pay to use it.
Habeas CEO Anne P. Mitchell said the system is truly unique is in its enforcement mechanisms that provide a way to prosecute spammers in the absence of laws that prohibit spamming.
Most anti-spam laws call for unsolicited e-mails to specify that they are advertisements in the subject line or prohibit disguising the information of the sender.
"It's frustrating because Congress is never going to pass any meaningful spam law," Mitchell said.
"There are very few laws that prohibit spamming, largely because it's hard to define what spam is," she added.
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