Virginia Supreme Court Says Anti-Spamming Law Not A Free Speech Violation
from the speak-freely,-just-don't-spam dept
Jeremy Jaynes, considered one of the biggest spammers in the US was sentenced to nine years in prison for violating a Virginia anti-spam law. As part of his appeal, Jaynes claimed that the anti-spam law itself was unconstitutional, as it violated his right to free speech. It would appear that argument hasn't worked out, as a somewhat divided Virginia Supreme Court has ruled against him, upholding the conviction. It does raise some interesting first amendment questions -- but most spamming activity involves so many other things that could be considered illegal (such as computer trespass, identity fraud, false advertising, etc., etc., etc.) that you would think spammers could be convicted on charges that have little to do with free speech issues.
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Filed Under: free speech, jeremy jaynes, spam
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As far as I see it - someone's email inbox is private property anyway. So you are really 'littering' on private property.
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Spam
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Re: Spam
While that would make various credit card companies that apparently want me happy, it's still damn annoying.
Also the law itself was pretty clearly violated. You don't like it, don't live in Virgnia or lobby to have it changed.
That's one thing people forget. The United States are somewhat supposed to be akin to the European Union, just more inline with one another. States are supposed to be their own little kingdoms that all obey a common set of rules and fund a common military. That's about it.
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Re: Re: Spam
That little misconception was settled in 1865 when the guy in the gray suit gave the guy in the blue suit his sword. And the correct verb is now IS, not ARE... "The United States 'IS'"--not "The United States 'ARE'". There effectively have been no 'States'Rights' since the court ruled in favor of the 'commerce clauses'. They own us, bubba.
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Re: Spam
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Re:
He already has 9 years in prison. I know 9 years might not seem like a lot of time to you, but in reality, it's a big portion of your life. That's more than some murderers or rapists get.
How about those advertising companies that pound your snail mail box with flyers and coupons every other day? They don't even HAVE an address on them! Talk about spam, lol.
What about the mail order catalogs? You order one thing from their online store, pretty soon you get a thick wasteful catalog mailed to you weekly. Save some friking trees already.
I could care less about the spam in my email. I use gmail, which has a REALLY good spam filter. So, I only get about 1-4 actual spams in my inbox. The rest are appropriately sent to the spam box.
When you say "put this bum in jail for as long as he lives", well that just sounds pretty damn stupid, doesn't it?
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Not to some of us. You see, most people have this hope that there will be some form of rehab that will change this guy's life but the real truth is that prison changes people for the worse not better(80% of the people released from prison are back in prison within 5 years, I think is the statistic) and this guy didn't have a very good attitude to begin with so when he gets out he will be a fine tuned criminal instead of a reformed spammer.
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Protected Speech vs Commercial Speech
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Re: Protected Speech vs Commercial Speech
> between "protected speech" (protected by the First Amendment)
> and "commercial speech", which enjoys no such protection.
> Spam is "commercial speech", therefore anti-spam laws are
> not unconstitutional.
That's just flat wrong.
Commercial speech does indeed enjoy 1st Amendment protection, just at a lesser level. The Supreme Court rulings hold that if speech is purely commercial in nature, it is subject to greater regulation by the government than pure speech but it cannot be outright banned or regulated so heavily that it's effectively banned.
The only type of speech that has no 1st Amendment protection whatsoever is obscenity.
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Re: Re: Protected Speech vs Commercial Speech
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Spam is a form of e-litter. Now, if he honestly has something to say to a specific person, that's fine, but spam is never to a specific person, and rarely has any opinions in it, his freedom to state his opinion has not been violated. So the intent of the right to freedom of speech is unharmed by this verdict.
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Re: Jurisdiction
I live in Virginia and about 60% of the spam I get is full of Japanese characters and is unreadable by me, even if were interested in whatever product they are trying to sell. How does Virginia's spam law help with that? It's not like they can extradite someone from Japan to answer for it even if they could find them.
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Yet another case where the law already exists to lock up the miscreants. If some would just do something simple like extend the mail fraud laws to spam it would make enforcement easier.
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not a first ammendment issue
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Free Speech ends when it interferes with one's rig
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Re: Free Speech ends when it interferes with one's
its not hard to see which email is spam or real in your inbox. is it your first day online or something?
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Re: Re: Free Speech ends when it interferes with o
Mail spam is bad enough, but then you take email spam and it becomes an issue. Mail spam is usually just a couple or a few a day. If that. Email spam multiplies day by day.
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Lock 'em up!
There are thousands of people out there like me, hundreds of thousands actually, who run multiple domains for clients, for myself, for non-profit organizations, etc. In addition to MY spam, I have to receive all their spam, deal with spam targeted at obtaining their idendities, or with getting their credit information. Its damned aggravating and should be penalized WAY harder than it is now.
Between my domains and a couple dozen clients I have to filter through 400-600 spam emails on a good day, in addition to the ones caught by spam filters. No one can possibly spend enough time blacklisting fake domains to make that a viable solution.
This is not a first amendment violation and they should be locked up to rot! ( And personally, I think they should share a cell with the mail-order companies too!)
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My inbox is not public. If I pay for email service, or even if it's free - to a degree, and depending on the terms of use I guess, it could be considered my property. Just like a car would be considered my property, even if I'm leasing it.
At least to the degree if you scratch it, I can seek damages, etc.
So if they want to create web pages on the public internet - fine. That's free speech.
Sending unsolicited email to MY inbox isn't free speech. It's intrusion.
If you agree that spam is 'free speech' - is it ok if I put up signs in your front yard advertising products to you?
The viewpoint that it's free speech ignores 'property rights' altogether.
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Laws not required
There probably should be a law that makes it clear that compiling and/or using blacklists are completely legal in all cases; they're only a suggestion of who not to accept mail from, and if I own the server I have no obligation to accept mail from all senders.
There doesn't need to be laws 'against spam'. The vast majority of spam comes through already-illegal zombie windows machines and already-illegal hacked servers. There needs to be a serious effort to enforce existing laws before we consider creating any more of them. Subpoena companies that are advertised in spam and demand that they reveal who they employed to send it. Track down the malware authors and bot-herders that make the current spam situation possible, and put them out of business.
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Re: Laws not required
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Good lawyers
Why didn't the state of Virginia charge the guy with all the other crimes (mail fraud, identity theft, false advertising, etc)? Or did they and the lawyer is trying the old strategy of "if one charge is unconstitutional, then my client should go free".
Most of the other crimes would probably "stick" because they've been around for a while. Yet Virginia is spending its tax money on the Supreme Court so they can hear a case on whether spamming is protected by free speech.
And what happens next? Does the guy (and his lawyer) appeal to a higher court? Should this case go all the way to the US Supreme Court, where the *US* taxpayers will have to pay for the time it takes the judges to hear the case?
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Thank god for some common sense
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Spammers in jail
Capitalist solution = filters, content blockers, peep holes and caller id with answering machines.
Socialist solution = make it illegal to voice an opinion, support a candidate, post a flyer, send an email, call to help people know a fact, opinion or be oposed to something or somebody.
People do not want bothered until they need that product, service, or idea then with the new laws it will be too late. The USSR legacy lives io in Washington and each state capitol.
Be careful what you vote for, you just might get it and more you do not want.
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Re: Spammers in jail
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Re: Spammers in jail
Spam on the other hand is intrusive, invasive, unwanted and makes proper use of a spammed email address nearly impossible. It effectively ruins email, and the nature of the spam and the spammer is often, if not always, illegal.
Once a "supposed" company does something that steps on your toes its crossed the line. This is why spammers will never be respected, because they do not respect the email recipient. There is little to no responsible use for spam, therefore spam does not warrant the use or respect that other forms of advertising (even when someone might not want them) do.
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Free speech
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Re: Free speech
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Re:
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Spam is not speech
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computer trespass? I don't think sending someone an unwanted email is computer trespass.
Identity fraud? Did he pretend to be someone else?
False advertising? Was there really V1AGrA or c1al1s available for the prices offered?
I fail to see any of those, but I fail to see a free speech issue, either.
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what if
Just wondering.
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Spam
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hey i like this....
but i have a problem... Im from mexico we dont have any antispamming laws in here so i want to write about it.
but i dont know if anybody can helpme find the antispamming laws in the us... thanx
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