Please cite this paper as: OECD (2004-01-22), “Background Paper for the OECD Workshop on Spam”, OECD Digital Economy Papers, No. 78, OECD Publishing, Paris. http://dx.doi.org/10.1787/232784860063 OECD Digital Economy Papers No. 78 Background Paper for the OECD Workshop on Spam OECD Unclassified DSTI/ICCP(2003)10/FINAL Organisation de Coopération et de Développement Economiques Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development 22-Jan-2004 ___________________________________________________________________________________________ English - Or. English DIRECTORATE FOR SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY AND INDUSTRY COMMITTEE FOR INFORMATION, COMPUTER AND COMMUNICATIONS POLICY Unclassified DSTI/ICCP(2003)10/FINAL BACKGROUND PAPER FOR THE OECD WORKSHOP ON SPAM English - Or. English JT00157096 Document complet disponible sur OLIS dans son format d'origine Complete document available on OLIS in its original format DSTI/ICCP(2003)10/FINAL FOREWORD This paper was presented to the Working Party on Telecommunications and Information Services Policy (TISP), the Working Party on Information Security and Privacy (WPISP) and the Committee on Consumer Policy during their meetings in 2003. It was declassified by the Committee for Information, Computer and Communications Policy and the Committee on Consumer Policy in January 2004. The report was prepared by Mr. Sung-il Ahn of the OECD’s Directorate for Science, Technology and Industry. It is published on the responsibility of the Secretary-General of the OECD. Copyright OECD, 2004. Applications for permission to reproduce or translate all or part of this material should be made to: Head of Publications Service, OECD, 2 rue André-Pascal, 75775 Paris Cedex 16, France. 2 DSTI/ICCP(2003)10/FINAL BACKGROUND PAPER FOR THE OECD WORKSHOP ON SPAM TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION .......................................................................................................................................... 4 The major role of Internet and e-mail ......................................................................................................... 4 Growth in spam........................................................................................................................................... 4 Detrimental effects of spam on consumer trust........................................................................................... 5 Purpose and scope of this paper .................................................................................................................. 5 OVERVIEW OF SPAM ................................................................................................................................. 6 What is spam? ............................................................................................................................................. 6 Economics of spam ..................................................................................................................................... 8 Why is spam proliferating? ....................................................................................................................... 10 Spam in the wireless world ....................................................................................................................... 11 WHAT ARE THE PROBLEMS ASSOCIATED WITH SPAM?................................................................ 13 Costs of spam ............................................................................................................................................ 13 Problems related to privacy....................................................................................................................... 15 Problems related to spam content.............................................................................................................. 15 Identity theft.............................................................................................................................................. 17 Reduced consumer confidence.................................................................................................................. 17 MEASURES TO REDUCE SPAM.............................................................................................................. 18 Legal and regulatory approaches of member countries.............................................................................18 Self-regulatory approaches........................................................................................................................ 23 Education and awareness .......................................................................................................................... 26 Technical solutions.................................................................................................................................... 27 CONCLUSION............................................................................................................................................. 31 ANNEX I – NATIONAL LEGISLATION ...................................................................................................32 ANNEX II – SPAM MATRIX ......................................................................................................................42 ANNEX III – THE REGULATION ASSOCIATED WITH SPAM IN EU DIRECTIVE 2002/58/EC OF 12 JULY 2002.........................................................................................48 ANNEX IV - ANTI-SPAM ORGANISATIONS..........................................................................................49 NOTES ............................................................................................................................................50 3 DSTI/ICCP(2003)10/FINAL INTRODUCTION The major role of Internet and e-mail As the number of Internet users increase, the Internet is gradually becoming an integral part of everyday life. Usage is expected to continue to grow. The number of Internet users in the OECD area was 213 million in 20011 and worldwide over 591 million in 2002.2 Expected worldwide usage is forecast to reach between 709.1 million to 945 million users by 2004.3 Many market analysts have viewed e-mail as one of the “killer applications” for the growth of the Internet. E-mail is quickly joining the telephone as an essential communication tool in people’s commercial and social lives. E-mail has become a powerful medium, not only for idea and information exchange, but for e-commerce including direct marketing. With its role as a quick and relatively inexpensive form of communication, e-mail has developed as one of the primary communication mechanisms for personal and business use. The International Data Corporation (IDC) estimates that there are about 700 million electronic mailboxes in the world and that the number will grow to 1.2 billion in 2005.4 IDC estimates that e-mail volume will continue to expand rapidly. Estimates suggest that some 31 billion messages were sent over the Internet in 2002, and that the number will reach or surpass 60 billion in 2006.5 Growth in spam Along with the growth of the Internet and e-mail, there has been a dramatic growth in bulk unsolicited electronic messages (commonly referred to as spam) over the last several years. 6 Spam can originate from any geographic location across the globe because Internet access is available in over 200 countries. The ease with which spammers can change the originating server for their messages means that even if the domestic e-marketing culture discourages spam, or legal restrictions are in place, spam messages can easily be sent from other locations. Despite the increasing deployment of anti-spam services and technologies, the number of spam messages continues to increase rapidly. The following statistics in Figure 1 show how fast spam has grown recently. According to Brightmail, an anti-spam software company, as of July 2003, unsolicited bulk mail volumes accounted for 50% of all e-mail traffic on the Internet, up from just 8% of traffic in mid-2001. Another anti-spam solution company, MessageLabs, found that 55% of the e-mails it scanned in May 2003 were spam. The Radicati Group estimates that 4.9 trillion spam e-mails will be sent in 2003.7 The growth rate is expected to increase in the future. Spam is a problem not only for personal e-mail accounts, but for corporate accounts. In particular, America Online (AOL), an Internet service provider (ISP), blocked 2.37 billion spam messages per day in April 2003. This represents increased costs and security risks to businesses and consumers alike. Even though some major e-mail service providers and research companies provide their data associated with spam, more data on the problems caused by spam, the rate of growth in spam, and the success of various proposed solutions would be useful to diagnose the current situation more precisely for 4 DSTI/ICCP(2003)10/FINAL formulating anti-spam policies. Further reflection is required as to which appropriate bodies could play a role in collecting data on spam. Figure 1. Percentages of total e-mail identified as spam according to Brightmail 50 50 48 49 45 46 45 42 42 40 41 40 39 37 38 38 35 34 30 % 25 20 15 10 5 0 Jun- Jul-02 Aug- Sep- Oct- Nov- Dec - Jan- Feb- Mar - Apr- May - Jun- Jul-03 02 02 02 02 02 02 03 03 03 03 03 03 Source: Brightmail (2003), “Spam Statistics”, www.brightmail.com/spamstats.html, accessed 8 December 2003. Detrimental effects of spam on consumer trust Consumer trust is key for the growth