One Step Ahead

Australia's anti-spam watchdog, the Australian Communications Authority (ACA), has declared Australia's anti-spam laws a success, claiming that major spammers in Australia have stopped their activities since the Spam Act was introduced three months ago.

This is a joke, right?

Although the ACA might be patting itself on the back about Australian spammers reducing their activities, this hasn't made one iota of difference to the amount of spam that Australians are getting. All independent reports say that the level of spam continues to increase.

The ACA is looking only at the spam it's empowered to act on (which is spam sent from Australia), but that's a narrow-minded view. It's certainly not what most Australians would have expected when the Government loudly proclaimed that its anti-spam laws would mean the end of spam. It's the old "The operation was a success, but the patient died" excuse.

Most of the spam originates in the USA, which has passed spam laws that make spam legal. Unless the USA outlaws spam, that situation won't get better for e-mail users anywhere.