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EU states to decide own anti-spam laws
Monday, November 19 2001
by Aoife White


A single European anti-spam law was rejected by Euro MPs last week when
representatives voted to leave anti-spam measures to EU member states.

The Irish government will now have the final say on allowing unsolicited e-mail
for marketing purposes only with the prior consent of subscribers ('opt-in') or
just giving subscribers the right to insist on being removed from mailing lists
('opt-out').





The decision flies against the European Commission's goal of a single EU system
for the information society. 







The Parliament was debating a directive on the processing of personal data and
the protection of privacy in the electronic communications sector. MEPs
recommended that subscribers have the right to ask for their names to be removed
from printed or electronic directories. But they want any data beyond what is
necessary to identify a subscriber only to be listed with that person's prior
consent.





The Parliament did vote in favour of allowing direct marketing by fax, SMS or
automated calling systems only with the consent of subscribers. It also approved
an amendment allowing companies to use e-mail addresses obtained from clients for
direct marketing on the understanding that subscribers could be removed from the
list at no cost. 







Andrew O'Shaughnessy, managing director of Irish e-mail services company
E-Search, said the Irish Internet Association and other industry groups had come
out in favour of an 'opt-in' law against spamming.





"Keeping an opt-out register puts a great onus on companies and I am yet to be
convinced that a central opt-out register would work practically. The opt-in
solution is really clear - unless you ask for it, you don't get it," he said. 





The directive allows member states to temporarily alter data protection
provisions to safeguard national security, defence, public security, the
prevention, investigation or prosecution of criminal offences.







Ireland is due to incorporate a previous European directive on data protection
into Irish law before the end of this year, to bring data protection legislation
here in line with the rest of the EU.





The European Parliament is on-line at href="http://www.europarl.eu.int">http://www.europarl.eu.int and more
information on data protection legislation in Ireland can be found at href="http://www.dataprivacy.ie">http://www.dataprivacy.ie.