You must have heard about email laws. But what are these email laws? They are child protection registry laws of State of Utah and Michigan. These laws established Do Not Email registries into which institutions and individuals that primarily serve minors can enter minors’ email address or only to those email addresses to which they have access. These institutions or individuals can also register their entire domain names.
By these laws people are prohibited from sending the email to addresses that have been in the registries for 30 days or if the email contains the material that is illegal for minors. No matter, whether the email is solicited or unsolicited, then also you can’t send such email. According to the Institute for Spam and Internet Public Policy, these email laws apply to almost all people in United States and those outside the United States but physically present in United States.
Utah Child Protection Registry Act
This law aims at protecting the minors from receiving the e-mails promoting services or products which cannot be sold lawfully or contain the material harmful to minors. It has a do-not-email registry and requires e-mail marketers to scrub their lists against the registry for a fee. This act prohibits the sending of communication to a particular contact point which is on the registry for more than 30 days.
The Utah child registry website provides an online registration for parent and marketers who want to check their e-mail addresses and other contact points against the database.
Michigan Children’s Protection Registry Act
This act is virtually identical to Utah Child Protection Registry Act. It establishes a registry of child contact points and sending a message to a contact points contained in the registry. The Michigan Children’s Protection Registry is a secure database of e-mail addresses and other electronic contact points such as mobile phone numbers (SMS), fax numbers and instant messenger IDs. It allows the Michigan’s parents and schools to register electronic contact points which children can access.
Imagine, you have some email addresses in your list that happen to be already in the do-not-email registry for 30 days and if you are not aware of it, and you send an email that contains a link to a web page having Adsense ads which advertise some automotive sales, can you imagine what happen to you? Your action can be considered as a cyber crime and you could face civil suit and fines or penalty. Therefore, you should make sure that never send any email that contains illegal material for minors. Don’t be panic about the laws. Instead, find more information about it.
