National Do Not Email Registry (DoNotEmail.gov)

Homeland Security
,
1

Objective: To reduce the volume of unwanted and junk email (spam) received by individuals and businesses, protect user privacy, and create a simple mechanism for email users to opt out of unsolicited commercial communications.

Key Features of the National Do Not Email Registry:

  1. Centralized Opt-Out System:
  • A government-managed website, DoNotEmail.gov, will allow individuals and businesses to register their email addresses to opt out of unsolicited commercial emails.
  • Registration will be free, simple, and secure. Users will verify ownership of their email addresses before adding them to the registry.
  1. Obligations for Email Senders:
  • Any entity sending commercial emails must regularly cross-check their mailing lists against the registry and exclude registered addresses.
  • Violators will face penalties for sending unsolicited emails to registered addresses.
  1. Exceptions:
  • Non-commercial communications, such as personal emails, emails from charities (with consent), or transactional messages (receipts, account updates), are exempt from the registry requirements.
  • Users can still give explicit consent to receive emails from specific organizations, overriding their registration.
  1. Enforcement and Penalties:
  • The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) will oversee enforcement of the Do Not Email Registry.
  • Penalties for violations will range from fines to potential suspension of a violator’s email domain for repeated offenses.
  • Fines:
    • First offense: $500 per unsolicited email.
    • Second offense: $1,000 per unsolicited email.
    • Subsequent offenses: $5,000 per unsolicited email, along with mandatory review and possible suspension of the sender’s email domain.
  1. Reporting Violations:
  • Users can report violations directly on the DoNotEmail.gov website by providing the email header and details of the unsolicited message.
  • The FTC will investigate and take action against violators.
  1. Protection Against Abuse:
  • Advanced encryption and security protocols will protect the registry database to prevent misuse or hacking.
  • Organizations will only access the registry through a secure API for verification purposes and will not see the full list of registered addresses.

Implementation Plan:

  1. Development Phase:
  • Build the DoNotEmail.gov website and secure database.
  • Create API tools for businesses to verify email addresses against the registry.
  1. Legislation:
  • Pass a federal law mandating compliance with the registry for all commercial email senders within the U.S. and international senders targeting U.S. residents.
  1. Public Awareness Campaign:
  • Launch a campaign to inform individuals and businesses about the registry and how to use it.
  • Highlight the penalties for non-compliance to ensure widespread adherence.
  1. Enforcement Phase:
  • Begin active monitoring and enforcement of the policy, with violators facing strict penalties.

Benefits:

  • Reduces the burden of spam and junk email on individuals and businesses.
  • Enhances user privacy and control over their email inbox.
  • Holds commercial email senders accountable for respecting user preferences.
  • Improves email deliverability for legitimate businesses by reducing the clutter caused by unwanted messages.

This policy proposal addresses a widespread annoyance and privacy concern affecting millions of Americans. By creating the DoNotEmail.gov registry, we can empower individuals to control their digital communication, reduce the volume of unwanted emails, and foster a more respectful online environment. Let’s work together to make inboxes more manageable for everyone.

2

Number one, it should be an Opt-In policy, if I want those emails, I need to opt-in. I do nothing, I don’t get them.

There was an interesting idea many years ago that did not go very far. To send emails you need some kind of ISP (Internet Service Provider), right.

ISP’s charge per e-mail per month to the customers to be paid to the government.
Example:
0-500 - no cost
501- 2,500 - $0.02 per email
2,501-10,000 - $0.05 per email
10,000 - 100,000 - $0.10 per email
100,001 - 500,000 - $0.10 per email
500,000 and over $1.00 per email

You find ISP’s not doing this, they lose there connection.

3

I agree, all emails, text messages, etc. should be opt-in. The problem is the spammers that don’t play by the rules (most of which are coming from outside the US)

I think you’d have a tough sell on metered traffic, most of the SPAM comes from internet providers outside the United States, and fraudsters know how to hide their trail was false data or using email servers that are not their own (and sometimes are being used illegally already), so how would you bill them?

Email also is not always your ISP. For example, I have a “hosting provider” that hosts my email. I pay that hosting provider a fixed rate for email and web hosting, and I don’t have email with my ISP.

My “day job” has their own in-house email servers, and don’t rely on an ISP (their ISP just provides connectivity).

I have the knowhow that even as I sit here and type this, I could have a new email server pumping out messages running in less than 15 minutes.

In each of the above cases the ISP has no clue what volume of email is being sent or received, they just see encrypted data. It’s not like the old days of the phone company where all long distance calls were “metered” and you were charged a per minute rate. Likewise, email is very decentralized, so if I send an email to you, it goes from my client to my hosting provider, which sends it directly to the email server of your ISP or hosting provider - there is no man in the middle.

So your proposal would force major changes to the message handling protocol, and even then there’s no guarantee that it would stop the flow.

My hosting provider, and most email providers in general have long had filtering systems that deals with the worst of the worst of SPAM. At the same time most of the major email providers now require “signatures” that validate the source of the email, no “signature”, or it can’t be validated will find their email rejected.

So today, there’s improvements on the Horizon, and most of the big players of email (Google, Microsoft, etc.) are already choking off SPAM and making a difference, even without laws in place (I know I had to work with my hosting provider to insure my emails go through).