Spammer to pay $25,000 settlement

Massachusetts Attorney General Thomas F. Reilly declared a victory in the war on unwanted e-mail yesterday, as a Florida spammer agreed to pay $25,000 to settle a state lawsuit alleging violations of a new federal antispam law.

''Internet marketers should note that Massachusetts takes seriously federal and state laws meant to protect against unwanted and misleading e-mails," Reilly said. But while Internet experts praised the settlement, they noted that massive quantities of spam continue to plague e-mail users.

The suit, filed in June, was the first filed by any state under the federal CAN-SPAM Act, which took effect in January. The law did not ban unsolicited e-mail messages altogether, but established regulations about the content of such messages. For example, the messages must identify themselves as advertisements; they must not use phony return addresses to conceal their origin; and they must give the recipient an easy way to request removal from the mailing list.

State officials say all three of these rules were violated by William C. Carson of Weston, Fla., whose business, DC Enterprises, sent thousands of e-mail messages advertising low-interest mortgages. The e-mails appeared to come from an address in Newton, even though the company had no offices there. In February, the attorney general's office, as well as the FBI and the Federal Trade Commission, received complaints from recipients of the unwanted e-mails. The state sued DC Enterprises under the CAN-SPAM Act and the Massachusetts Consumer Protection Act.

Under the settlement, DC Enterprises has agreed to halt its violations of the antispam law, and to comply with state regulations that require mortgage brokers to display their license numbers in all advertisements. Efforts by the Globe to contact DC Enterprises were unsuccessful.

Antispam experts viewed the settlement as good news.

''I think this is tremendous progress," said Phyllis Schneck, vice president of strategic development at CipherTrust Inc., an e-mail software company in Alpharetta, Ga. ''We've always said fighting spam is a combination of technology and policy . . . and this is a true sign that enforcement is picking up."

Ray Everett-Church, legal counsel for the Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial E-Mail, said the settlement proved that legislation can drive spammers out of business. ''Once you get a spammer in your sights and can bring them to court, they relatively quickly fold," said Everett-Church. ''Once you find them, it's easy to get them to stop doing what they're doing."

But Everett-Church believes that the legal attack on spammers might be further along if Congress had not passed CAN-SPAM. That's because the law allows only federal and state governments to sue spammers, not individuals. The law also supersedes a number of state laws that allowed spam recipients to sue.

''We were seeing a lot more activity in the courts prior to CAN-SPAM," said Everett-Church, who said federal and state officials are too busy with other matters to sue dozens of spammers.

After 10 months, there's no evidence the new federal law has reduced the quantity of spam. ''All the reports I see are the numbers keep marching up," said Everett-Church. Indeed, CipherTrust estimates that about 80 percent of its customers' incoming e-mail is spam, compared to 68 percent at the start of the year.

But Schneck believes better filtering software, combined with tougher enforcement, will make a dent. ''If we're not at the peak," she said, ''we're pretty close."

Hiawatha Bray can be reached at bray@globe.com.