Gov. Purdue Signs Georgia's Slam Spam Act Into Law

Ga. Gov. Sonny Perdue recently signed into law the Georgia Slam Spam E-Mail Act (SB62). "Thanks to the Georgia Slam Spam E-mail Act, we can start cleaning up spam in this state and put our citizens back in control of their online lives," Perdue said. "This is a tough anti-spam bill and I'm ready to put it to work protecting Georgians."

The law classifies sending e-mail and employing false or misleading practices, such as forging headers, using misleading subject headlines or falsely stating that the information in the e-mail was requested as a misdemeanor. Sending unsolicited e-mail becomes a felony if one of the following conditions are met:

• A high volume of spam, such as more than 10,000 messages in any 24 hour time period is sent
• The unsolicited e-mail generates more than $1,000 in revenue from a single spam message or more than $50,000 from all spam transmitted to any single Internet Service Provider (ISP);
• Where the defendant knowingly uses a minor to assist in the transmission of spam.

Criminal penalties for a felony include a fine of not more than $50,000.00 or imprisonment of not more than five years, or both. For a misdemeanor, penalties include a fine of not more than $1,000.00 or imprisonment of not more than 12 months, or both.

In addition, SB62 enables ISP's, such as EarthLink, and domain-owners to bring civil charges against the spammers for fraudulent and deceptive e-mail. The act does not limit or regulate in any way the sending of legitimate advertisements through e-mail.

--CM