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Spam Act 2003
(Australia) |
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This does not constitute
legal advice.
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SPAM PROHIBITED
The Spam Act says that unsolicited
commercial electronic messages must not be
sent. Messages should only be sent to an
address when it is known that the person
responsible for that address has consented
to receive it.
RULES FOR SENDING COMMERCIAL ELECTRONIC
MESSAGES
Commercial electronic messages must
contain:
• Accurate information about the sender of
the message; and
• A functional way for the message’s
recipients to indicate that they do not wish
to receive such messages in the future –
that they wish to unsubscribe.
ADDRESS HARVESTING SOFTWARE, HARVESTED
ADDRESS LISTS
Business must not use electronic address
harvesting software or lists which have been
generated using such software, for the
purpose of sending unsolicited commercial
electronic messages.
MESSAGES COVERED BY THE ACT
The Spam Act covers commercial
electronic messages that are sent using
applications such as:
• email;
• short message service (SMS);
• multimedia message service (MMS);
and
• instant messaging (iM).
MESSAGES NOT COVERED BY THE ACT
The following examples are not covered
by the Spam Act:
• Non-electronic messages (such as ordinary
mail, paper flyers etc);
• Voice-to- voice telemarketing;
• The majority of “pop up” windows that
appear on the internet (they are usually an
intrinsic part of a webpage that has been
accessed, rather than a message sent to the
recipient address); and
• Messages without any commercial content
that do not contain links or directions to a
commercial website or location.
THE ACT COVERS MESSAGES WITH AN
AUSTRALIAN LINK
The provisions of the Spam Act cover
commercial electronic messages:
• originating in Australia that are sent to
any destination; and
• originating overseas that are sent to an
address accessed in Australia. |
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Spam - Three Steps to
Follow |
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We’ve listed the three steps your business
should follow to satisfy the requirements of
the Spam Act.
When reviewing your business practices and
the content of your commercial messages to
ensure you comply with the Spam Act, you
should consider the following three steps.
STEP 1 - CONSENT
Your commercial messages must only be
sent when you have consent.
This may be express consent from the person
you wish to contact – a direct indication
that it is okay to send the message, or
messages of that nature.
It is also possible to infer consent based
on a business or other relationship with the
person and their conduct.
STEP 2 - IDENTIFY
Your commercial messages must always
contain clear and accurate identification of
who is responsible for sending the message
and how they can be contacted.
It is important for people to know who is
contacting them and how they can get in
touch in return. This will generally be the
organisation that authorises the sending of
the message, rather than the name of the
person who actually hits the “send” button.
Identification details that are provided
must be reasonably likely to be accurate for
a period of 30 days after the message is
sent. This would be a consideration if the
business was about to change address.
STEP 3 - UNSUBSCRIBE
Your commercial messages should contain
an unsubscribe facility, allowing people to
indicate that commercial messages should not
be sent to them in future. This could be as
simple as a line in your message saying “If
you wish to opt out from future messages,
send a reply with the subject UNSUBSCRIBE”.
After a person indicates that they wish to
unsubscribe, you have five working days to
honour their request. Similar to the
identification of the message’s sender (step
2, above) the unsubscribe facility must be
reasonably likely to remain accurate and
functional for a 30 day period. It need not
be an automated process, but should be
reliable. |
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Spam ACT - More
Information |
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Additional Information in relation to the
Spam Act and preventative measures is
available from the ACA and NOIE websites
located at the following addresses:
www.aca.gov.au (regards
Spam ACT) and
www.noie.gov.au (regards
Spam ACT)
A more comprehensive guide to the
requirements of the Spam Act, is available
from the
NOIE website.
Spam Act 2003: A practical guide for
business is available with other resources
from
www.noie.gov.au/publications/index.htm |
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Change Options
and Opt-Out |
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site provides users the opportunity to opt-out
of receiving communications from us and
our partners at the point where we request
information about the visitor. This site gives users the following options
for removing their information from our
database to not receive future communications
or to no longer receive our service. Refer to our
contact
page. |
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| Corrections
and Updates |
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gives users the following options for changing
and modifying information previously provided.
Refer to our
contact
page. |
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