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October 10, 2004 March 20, 2003
March 7, 2002 |
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NSI Partners CEO, VP Testify Before Maryland Panel; Ask Legislators to Make Proposed “Spam” Law the Nation’s Toughest GAITHERSBURG, MD – MARCH 7, 2002 – Intent on stopping spam – email spam, that is - two executives of a Gaithersburg e-business consultancy testified last week before a Maryland House of Delegates committee supporting a bill to ban unscrupulous marketers from flooding Marylanders’ email accounts with unsolicited commercial email messages, or “spam.” NSI Partners’ Anthony Kirlew and Donald Baker praised legislators’ desire to protect Marylanders from receiving a growing torrent of junk email, while calling for amendments that would make the bill - if passed by the General Assembly - the nation’s toughest anti-spam law. “Unsolicited, bulk commercial email is more than an irritant,” said Kirlew, CEO of NSI Partners and a network administration expert. “It lowers productivity for both businesses and individuals, and costs businesses in money and personnel to filter and process the stuff. We need to transfer this time and cost burden from spam recipients to its senders.” Kirlew and Baker testified on February 28 in Annapolis before the Maryland House Economic Matters Committee, which is currently considering the anti-spam House Bill 915. The bill was introduced by Del. Joan Pitkin (D-23), a long-time consumer advocate. As written, the bill would ban the transmission of commercial email that deliberately hides or confuses the sender’s identity. “It’s almost impossible to unsubscribe from these email lists, because the return addresses are very often fake,” Kirlew told the committee. Referring to a Washington State anti-spam law, Kirlew asked committee members to strengthen the Maryland bill by requiring commercial email marketers to eliminate Maryland residents’ email addresses before sending spam. The Washington law accomplishes this through a database of state residents’ email addresses, which email marketers must consult to remove those addresses prior to sending unsolicited commercial messages. Kirlew also responded to questions regarding penalties for lawbreakers by citing the Washington and California anti-spam laws, both of which impose significant monetary penalties on marketers convicted of violating the law. In his testimony, Baker – Vice President, Marketing at NSI Partners – also pointed to the success of junk fax laws in answering a committee member’s concern over the possibility of stopping spammers. “Within a few years, junk fax laws have successfully reduced the torrent of commercial junk faxes to a trickle,” Baker said. He suggested lawmakers draw from language contained in Maryland’s junk fax law, which requires a “preexisting business relationship” between fax sender and recipient in order to stay within the law. “The requirement of a ‘preexisting business relationship’ does not hinder free speech, but it does shift the responsibility from the recipient to the sender of such messages,” he said. “I suggest that while it may be difficult to stem the flood of unsolicited commercial email, it seems to have worked in the case of junk faxes. In any event, I believe it is better to do something than do nothing.” Following their testimony, Economic Matters Committee member Del. Shane E. Pendergrass (D-13A) asked Kirlew and Baker to provide further advice on House Bill 915 as the committee amends it prior to a final vote to refer the bill to the full House. If passed, the bill must be approved by both the full House, as well as the State Senate, before becoming law later this year. It would join 20 other states’ laws restricting the transmission of unsolicited commercial email spam. # # # About NSI Partners:
Donald L. Baker
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