Collecting E-Mail Addresses Legally

Spam is bothersome enough that lawmakers enacted the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 to help prosecute spammers. The acronym comes from its official title, the Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act of 2003. The law makes certain e-mail marketing practices illegal and gives legal definitions to many best practices.

The CAN-SPAM Act makes certain types of e-mail address collection illegal and requires permission from your e-mail list subscribers before you send certain types of content. (The CAN-SPAM Act uses the term affirmative consent instead of permission.

Potentially illegal e-mail addresses collection methods aren't always easy to spot, so the best practice is to make sure that you have explicit permission from everyone on your list to send them e-mail. Here are some best practices for steering clear of potentially permission-less e-mail addresses:

• Never purchase an e-mail list from a company that allows you to keep the e-mail addresses as a data file.

E-mail addresses kept in a data file are easily bought and sold, and e-mails addresses with explicit permission are too valuable to sell.

• Never collect e-mail addresses from Web sites and other online directories.

You don't have affirmative consent from the owner if you harvest e-mail addresses without their knowledge or agreement.

• Don't use an e-mail address collection service.

Unless such a service collects confirmed permission from every subscriber that it obtains.

• Don't borrow an e-mail list from another business or send e-mail to an e-mail list.

Those subscribers didn't explicitly opt-in to receive your e-mails.

• Don't rent an e-mail list unless you are certain that the list rental company's practices are legally compliant.

Most rental companies don't have permission-based lists.