FYI : Washington State Outlaws Spam

[Eric Luyten <]

TidBITS#422/30-Mar-98

**Washington State Outlaws Spam** -- According to a Seattle Times
  article, Washington State Governor Gary Locke last week signed
  into law a bill that aims to reduce unsolicited commercial email,
  better known as spam (see "Damn that Spam!" in NetBITS-003_, or
  search for "spam" in the NetBITS search engine). The new law,
  which takes effect in 90 days, makes it a violation for spammers
  to send email messages with forged return addresses, fake header
  information, or misleading subject lines. The law applies both to
  spam originating within the state of Washington and spam directed
  at people who the spammer knows, or has reason to know, are
  Washington residents. It also places the burden on the spammer to
  determine whether or not any given individual resides in
  Washington. People who receive such spam could collect up to $500
  per message, and Internet service providers could collect up to
  $1,000. It remains to be seen how easy it will be to collect
  damages, but no matter what, the new law should create a possible
  economic liability to spam where none has previously existed.
 
<http://www.seattletimes.com/news/local/html98/junk_032698.html>
<http://db.netbits.net/getbits.acgi?nbart=04488>