[WSIS CS-Plenary] Spam as an issue

[Jonathan Cave]

It's not clear to this observer how local legal action can begin to tackle 
this issue.

Already in 2002, Europe paid €2.25 Billion in lost productivity due to 
spam, according to Erkki Liikanen then European Commissioner for IT. The EU 
is trying to do something about it, but most spam comes from outside its 
borders (back then, the US and China were the main sources). What incentive 
do net supplier regimes have to act against spam?

Corresponding to the two perspectives you identify, I see two scenarios: 
collective, hopefully global and voluntarily coordinated action; or 
Draconian unilateral responses (opting out by specific communities, 
censorship of traffic from rogue domains', strict ISP liability, etc.) that 
could radically cut the connectivity and utility of the Internet.

I don't think the 'corner solutions' (global government or a lasez-faire 
trip further into the swamp) are sustainable.

Cheers,

J.

At 15:09 31/01/2005, you wrote:
>Just a small observation from the above discussion: those who would
>put spam on the list of priorities have very different ideas of its
>purpose. One tendency is „to protect the world from spam" (because of
>the costs, etc.), the other tendency is „to protect the world from
>protection from spam" (to ensure that no legitimate mail is filtered,
>etc.).
>
>I am not quite sure that spam should be included at all but if yes,
>then in the second alternative (at least, for raising awareness and
>the like). The first one is really not much different from other
>issues that are to be solved at the local level (starting from legal
>definition of spam and so on).
>
>Yulia
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