Spammer Loses Lawsuit Saying Everyone Must Accept Spam

Legal Issues

from the what-a-world dept

It turns out that some spam operation in Texas had been sending out thousands of emails to students at the University of Texas. The IT staff at UT put up a filter that blocked out that spam. All this seems reasonable enough. However, the spammers’ confused reading of the law made them believe that based on CAN-SPAM and the First Amendment everyone should be required to receive their emails and it would be against the law to filter them. So, they sued the University of Texas for daring to filter spam. Luckily, a judge has quickly tossed out the case, realizing that just because CAN-SPAM lays down the rules for spamming, it doesn’t mean service providers have to deliver the spam to their users. It seems that too many people have confused the First Amendment to believe that everyone must listen to them – and not just that the government can’t silence them. There’s a very big difference.