FCC Allows SMSpam
In a slightly bizarre ruling, the FCC has announced that the CAN-SPAM law covers email messages sent to phones but does not include SMS spam. First of all, it’s not clear why it was even a question whether or not the law covered email to phones. Why should it matter what the receiving device is? I check email all the time on my phone — plenty of it is spam. I didn’t think that it was noteworthy that I was using a client on my phone, rather than a client on a desktop computer to check my account. On top of that, by specifically calling out and allowing SMS spam, the FCC has pretty much guaranteed that we’re going to start seeing a lot more SMS spam in the US now, as spammers will start to claim it’s “legal.”
