Page:United States Statutes at Large Volume 117.djvu/2718

 PUBLIC LAW 108–187—DEC. 16, 2003

117 STAT. 2699

Public Law 108–187 108th Congress An Act To regulate interstate commerce by imposing limitations and penalties on the transmission of unsolicited commercial electronic mail via the Internet.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

Dec. 16, 2003 [S. 877]

This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Controlling the Assault of NonSolicited Pornography and Marketing Act of 2003’’, or the ‘‘CANSPAM Act of 2003’’.

Controlling the Assault of NonSolicited Pornography and Marketing Act of 2003. 15 USC 7701 note.

SEC. 2. CONGRESSIONAL FINDINGS AND POLICY.

15 USC 7701.

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

(a) FINDINGS.—The Congress finds the following: (1) Electronic mail has become an extremely important and popular means of communication, relied on by millions of Americans on a daily basis for personal and commercial purposes. Its low cost and global reach make it extremely convenient and efficient, and offer unique opportunities for the development and growth of frictionless commerce. (2) The convenience and efficiency of electronic mail are threatened by the extremely rapid growth in the volume of unsolicited commercial electronic mail. Unsolicited commercial electronic mail is currently estimated to account for over half of all electronic mail traffic, up from an estimated 7 percent in 2001, and the volume continues to rise. Most of these messages are fraudulent or deceptive in one or more respects. (3) The receipt of unsolicited commercial electronic mail may result in costs to recipients who cannot refuse to accept such mail and who incur costs for the storage of such mail, or for the time spent accessing, reviewing, and discarding such mail, or for both. (4) The receipt of a large number of unwanted messages also decreases the convenience of electronic mail and creates a risk that wanted electronic mail messages, both commercial and noncommercial, will be lost, overlooked, or discarded amidst the larger volume of unwanted messages, thus reducing the reliability and usefulness of electronic mail to the recipient. (5) Some commercial electronic mail contains material that many recipients may consider vulgar or pornographic in nature. (6) The growth in unsolicited commercial electronic mail imposes significant monetary costs on providers of Internet access services, businesses, and educational and nonprofit institutions that carry and receive such mail, as there is a finite volume of mail that such providers, businesses, and

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