The British government Wednesday scrapped a plan to regulate unsolicited commercial e-mail (spam) in favor of a system of industry self-regulation.
The government could be forced to reverse its position if the Brussels-based European Union adopts the anti-spam directive it is currently debating.
Its decision not to regulate unsolicited commercial e-mail came two days after the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) unveiled a series of new e-commerce rules under the recently revised Consumer Protection Regulations that give consumers seven days to cancel orders and marketers 30 days to fulfill orders.
The DTI’s proposal would have required direct marketers to obtain a person’s permission before sending them unsolicited commercial e-mail, and it would have implemented the European Union’s 1997 Distance Selling Directive with that requirement.
The DTI would not give any reason for its abrupt reversal of position. A spokesman said, “The government has decided that the most effective way to control unsolicited commercial e-mail is through self-regulation,” which relies heavily on consumer use of the London-based Direct Marketing Association’s mail and telephone preference services.
Those services are patterned after those of the U.S. Direct Marketing Association.
The DTI spokesman emphasized that Internet service providers are participating in national and international agreements to pull the plug on serial spammers.
The British DMA said in a brief statement that it welcomed the government’s decision not to require direct marketers to obtain a person’s permission before they send unsolicited commercial e-mail to consumers. “Opt-in-for e-mails would seriously constrain the development of e-commerce,” it said.
Richard Clayton of the London Internet Exchange, who claimed that very few British firms are sending out unsolicited commercial e-mails, expressed little faith in the effectiveness of the DMA’s e-mail preference service.
He and others, including Allen Swann of Prime Response International, an online marketing company, express a fear that the government’s action could lead to a sharp rise in the number of short unsolicited commercial e-mail messages to mobile phones across Britain.
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