What are legal differences between Spam and UCE and Opt-In?
As a general rule, you can quickly tell spam by the subject line and attachments. Opt-In lists are where people signed up for a product or service, and approved use of their email to recieve related announcements. UCE (Unsolicited Commercial Email) tends to be recognizable as coming from a valid business, with real names (such as mp3.com, Sears, Columbia House, Hoover Vacume Cleaners), etc. with real phone numbers, real remove links, and often mainstream products which most people don’t mind hearing about on occasion. Certain types of spam are illegal in some states, whereas practically all UCE and Opt-In mailings are legal in all states (US). Stricter definitions are available at www.DEAA.org. Spammers in general tend to ignore legal and ethical guidelines, they munge their email name and do not provide valid urls and return addresses to be contacted, and also try to hide their identity through often-illegal means like IP Masquerading. Often, spam contains generally unwelcome content
