CAN-SPAM is only a week old in terms of enforcement, but a number of Internet service providers' officials and others are saying the spam just keeps on clogging.
The new federal law – which drew fire because of its lack of an opt-in requirement, critics saying its opt-out orientation would still mean a continuing suffocation from spam because the spammers were still allowed an easy entry – took effect New Year's Day, but ISPs like EarthLink say there has been no big shift or change in content or legitimacy and volume.
If anything, according to a published report, online marketers may be sending out more bulk e-mail than before CAN-SPAM took effect.
According to Reuters, overall e-mail volume fell during the holidays with people in front of the computer less, but the spam proportion stayed consistent. The news wire said Verizon and EarthLink reported spam equaling 55 percent of their incoming traffic still, while America Online said CAN-SPAM prodded "many spammers" to route traffic through Asian computers so it would be harder to trace.
"There was a noticeable and distinct shift in spam traffic patterns that took place almost overnight," AOL spokesman Nicholas Graham told Reuters. But online marketer Scott Richter told the news wire he merely altered text of the "hundreds of millions" of messages he sends every day to include his street address and a clear notice that the messages are advertising, which the new law requires bulk commercial e-mailers to do.
"We're doing fine," Richter told Reuters about his own Optinrealbig.com, saying they were doing even more business. On the other hand, "doing fine" can have another meaning in the end: Richter, according to Reuters, faces fraud charges in New York and Washington states.
