Barely had President Bush signed the so-called CAN-SPAM Act when anti-spam software maker Clearswift delivered what could be called good news: porn spam isn’t exactly number one on the hit parade, with diet pills, Viagra, and other healthcare spam messages proving the leading spam going to inboxes in November.
The company’s new study, released Dec. 16, said health-related spam rose “significantly” during that month, while porn spam actually fell in the same period.
This was interesting news to adult industry veteran Cynthia Fanshaw. “I get 400 percent more spam for non-adult related products than I do for adult,” she told AVN.com, “and my e-mail addresses are adult-industry related.”
Clearswift issues a Spam Index each month that reviews both the frequency and the nature of junk e-mail solicitations, based on surveying (as for November) 15,000 customers who got spam that found ways around Clearswift’s spam-blocking programs. They say that, in November, healthcare-related spam took up almost half the spam in cyberspace, compared to 27 percent in October; while porn spam took up only 14 percent of all November spam, and finance-related spam ranked at 12.5 percent.
But the company also said the surge in health spam might mean e-marketers are showing the most interest in those who have to deal with individual ailments and disabilities. E-mail, Clearswift said, is “the ideal channel for selling products like Viagra,” especially given the confidential nature of sexual and certain other medical problems. But Clearswift also believes the holiday season in general is an ideally fertile ground for spam, since consumer interest is so magnified – especially with regard to dieting following those holiday binges.
Nearly all healthcare-related spam Clearswift studied originated in the United States, the company said.
Clearswift vice president for marketing Craig Hampton told reporters it doesn’t mean porn spam is likely to disappear, despite the big November drop. He said porn spam rises and falls month by month, based in part on users and anti-spam programmers adjusting filters to stop new spammers’ techniques.
But the drop in porn spam doesn’t exactly mean that those who still receive it will be thrilled, said Adult Sites Against Child Pornography executive director Joan Irvine.
“Even though the adult-related spam only represents 14 percent of all spam last month, people are incensed when they receive unsolicited adult-oriented e-mails,” Irvine said. “They get even more upset and vocal when children receive these e-mails.” ASACP called on companies who do legitimate e-marketing to label their materials as “ADV ADLT” to keep children from seeing adult materials unwittingly.
“It is just a good business practice in today’s political climate,” she said.
Fanshaw said that seeing adult spam “in the midst of the home mortgage and loans, new products by major manufacturers, travel, and medical spam... helps me see the industry is still alive.” But it doesn’t exactly mean she applauds porn spam.
“It’s a media to be abused until federal law and the means to prosecute become readily available,” she said. “It’s whatever is making money, actually, a pulse of the Internet population. Spammers will try everything until spam stops making money.”
