Unsolicitated Commercial E-Mail

The Problem

"Spamming is the scourge of electronic-mail and newsgroups on the Internet. It can seriously interfere with the operation of public services, to say nothing of the effect it may have on any individual's e-mail mail system. ... Spammers are, in effect, taking resources away from users and service suppliers without compensation and without authorization."

-- Vint Cerf, Senior Vice President, MCI
and acknowleged "Father of the Internet"

If you feel you have been referred to this page in error and your email, site, domain, et al. should not be blocked after reading this, you may fill in the form at the end with your reasons and we will consider your request. Be advised: WE HATE SPAM!

Following is an explanation of why UCE is a threat to the viability of Internet email and a danger to Internet commerce. But if you are fed up with spam, it's also important to understand what not to do.

Junk Email

We all get junk mail at home. It's an accepted fact of life, at least in the U.S. So why is Unsolicited Commercial Email (UCE) -- a/k/a "spam" or "junk email" -- a problem?

To understand the problem of UCE, you must first understand what is most often advertised via UCE. There are many places on the Internet where copies of UCE are reposted by recipients and system administrators in order to help notify the Internet community about where UCE is originating. Surveying mailing lists like SPAM-L and USENET newsgroups in the news.admin.net-abuse.* hierarchy, you will see that there are very few reputable marketers using UCE to advertise goods and services. To the contrary, the most commonly seen UCEs advertise:

So why is this such a problem?




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