I
105TH CONGRESS
2D SESSION
H. R. 4124
To promote online commerce and communications, to protect consumers and
service providers from the misuse of computer facilities by others sending
unsolicited commercial electronic mail over such facilities, and for other
purposes.
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
JUNE 24, 1998
Mr. COOK introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee
on Commerce
A BILL
To promote online commerce and communications, to protect
consumers and service providers from the misuse of com-
puter facilities by others sending unsolicited commercial
electronic mail over such facilities, and for other pur-
poses.
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘E-Mail User Protection
Act of 1998’’.
SEC. 2. FINDINGS.
Congress makes the following findings:
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(1) The Internet has become a critical mode of
global communication and now presents unprece-
dented opportunities for the development and growth
of global commerce and an integrated worldwide
economy.
(2) The receipt of unsolicited commercial e-mail
may result in undue monetary costs to recipients
who cannot refuse to accept such mail and who
incur costs for the storage of such mail, or for the
time spent accessing, reviewing, and discarding such
mail, or for both.
(3) An increasing number of senders of unsolic-
ited commercial e-mail purposefully disguise the
source of such mail so as to prevent recipients from
responding to such mail quickly and easily.
(4) Because recipients of unsolicited commercial
e-mail that does not provide a return address are
unable to avoid the receipt of such mail through rea-
sonable means, such mail may threaten the privacy
of recipients.
(5) By providing remedies similar to those pro-
vided with respect to unsolicited facsimile trans-
missions and automated dialing equipment in the
Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991, the
Congress can provide privacy protections without in-
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fringing important Constitutional rights or imperil-
ing the commercial development of the Internet.
SEC. 3. RESTRICTIONS ON THE USE OF UNSOLICITED COM-
MERCIAL E-MAIL.
Part 1 of title II of the Communications Act of 1934
is amended by inserting after section 230 (47 U.S.C. 230)
the following new section:
‘‘SEC. 231. RESTRICTIONS ON THE USE OF UNSOLICITED
COMMERCIAL E-MAIL.
‘‘(a) VIOLATIONS DIRECTED AT INTERACTIVE COM-
PUTER SERVICES.—
‘‘(1) For purposes of this subsection, a violation
is defined as each initiation of a transmission with-
out regard to the number of electronic mail address-
es to which the transmission is sent.
‘‘(2) It shall be a violation of this Act, punish-
able under subsection (c)(1), for any person—
‘‘(A) to intentionally initiate the trans-
mission of an unsolicited commercial e-mail
message from an unregistered or fictitious
Internet domain, or an unregistered or fictitious
electronic mail address, for the purpose of—
‘‘(i) preventing replies to such mes-
sage through the use of standard reply
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mechanisms in the recipient’s electronic
mail system, or
‘‘(ii) preventing receipt of standard
notices of non-delivery;
‘‘(B) to intentionally use or distribute a
computer program or other technical mecha-
nism or procedure intending to disguise the
source of unsolicited commercial e-mail mes-
sages or to disable or circumvent a mail filter-
ing tool;
‘‘(C) to intentionally distribute, through
computer software or in any other manner, a
collection or list of electronic mail addresses
knowing that the collection or list contains ad-
dresses of persons who have previously re-
quested removal from the list;
‘‘(D) to intentionally register, create, or
cause to be created an Internet domain under
false pretenses or to apply for, register, or oth-
erwise obtain the use of an Internet electronic
mail account for the sole or primary purpose of
disguising the source of unsolicited electronic
mail messages;
‘‘(E) to direct an unsolicited commercial e-
mail message through the server of an inter-
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active computer service provider to one or more
subscribers of the interactive computer service,
knowing or having reason to know that such ac-
tion is in contravention of the rules of the inter-
active computer service with respect to unsolic-
ited commercial e-mail messages;
‘‘(F) knowing or having reason to know
that such action is in contravention of the rules
of an interactive computer service, to access the
server of such interactive computer service and
to use a computer program to collect electronic
mail addresses of subscribers of the interactive
computer service for the purpose of sending
such subscribers unsolicited commercial e-mail
or selling or distributing the list thereby col-
lected or obtained.
‘‘(b) VIOLATIONS DIRECTED AT INDIVIDUALS.—
‘‘(1) For purposes of this subsection, a violation
is defined as each electronic mail address which re-
ceives a transmission.
‘‘(2) It shall be a violation of this Act, punish-
able under subsection (c)(2), for any person—
‘‘(A) to fail to comply with the request of
the recipient of an electronic mail message,
made to the sender or mailing list manager, as
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appropriate, to cease sending electronic mes-
sages to the recipient in the future; or
‘‘(B) to initiate the transmission of an un-
solicited commercial e-mail message to a recipi-
ent despite having been given prior notice (ei-
ther directly or through a standard method de-
veloped, adopted, or modified by an Internet
standard setting organization, such as the
Internet Engineering Task Force, to better fa-
cilitate pre-emptive consumer control over unso-
licited, commercial e-mail) that the recipient
does not wish to receive such messages.
‘‘(c) LIABILITY FOR VIOLATIONS.—Any person or en-
tity who violates any provision of subsection (a) or (b)
shall be liable to any injured party for such relief as is
set out below.
‘‘(1) RELIEF
FOR
INTERACTIVE
COMPUTER
SERVICES.—In an action under this section for viola-
tion of subsection (a), relief may include—
‘‘(A) such preliminary and other equitable
or declaratory relief as may be appropriate;
‘‘(B) for actual monetary loss from a viola-
tion, statutory damages of not more than
$10,000 for each violation, and, if the court
finds that the defendant’s actions were particu-
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larly egregious, willful, or knowing, the court
may, in its discretion, increase the amount of
an award to an amount equal to not more than
10 times the amount available hereunder, and
‘‘(C) reasonable attorneys’ fees and other
litigation costs reasonably incurred.
‘‘(2) RELIEF FOR INDIVIDUALS.—
‘‘(A) In an action under this section for
violation of subsection (b), relief shall be sought
in an action brought by the attorney general of
one or more states.
‘‘(B) Whenever the attorney general of a
State, or an official or agency designated by a
State, has reason to believe that any person has
engaged or is engaging in a pattern or practice
of transmitting unsolicited commercial e-mail to
residents of that State in violation of this sec-
tion or the regulations prescribed under this
section, the State may bring a civil action on
behalf of its residents for such relief as may be
appropriate.
‘‘(C) In an action under this subsection,
appropriate relief includes—
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‘‘(i) an injunction or such preliminary
and other equitable or declaratory relief as
may be appropriate;
‘‘(ii) an action to recover statutory
$500 in damages for each violation; or
‘‘(iii) both such actions.
‘‘(D) If the court finds the defendant’s ac-
tions were particularly egregious, willful, or
knowing, the court may, in its discretion, in-
crease the amount of the award to an amount
equal to not more than ten times the amount
available in (C).
‘‘(E) reasonable attorneys’ fees and other
litigation costs reasonably occurred.
‘‘(d) STATE LAW.—Nothing in this Act shall be con-
strued to prevent any State from enforcing any State law
that is consistent with this Act. No cause of action may
be brought and no liability may be imposed under any
State or local law that is inconsistent with this Act.
‘‘(e) DEFINITIONS.—In this Act:
‘‘(1) ELECTRONIC MAIL ADDRESS.—
‘‘(A) IN GENERAL.—The term ‘electronic
mail address’ means a destination (commonly
expressed as a string of characters) to which
electronic mail can be sent or delivered.
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‘‘(B) INCLUSION.—In the case of the
Internet, the term ‘electronic mail address’ may
include an electronic mail address consisting of
a user name of mailbox (commonly referred to
as the ‘local part’) and a reference to an Inter-
net domain (commonly referred to as the ‘do-
main part’).
‘‘(2) INITIATES THE TRANSMISSION.—The term
‘initiates the transmission’, in the case of an elec-
tronic mail message, refers to the action of the origi-
nal sender of the message and not to any interven-
ing computer service that may handle or retransmit
the message, unless the intervening computer service
retransmits the message with an intent to engage in
activities prohibited by this Act.
‘‘(3) INTERACTIVE
COMPUTER
SERVICE.—The
term ‘interactive computer service’ has the meaning
given that term in section 230(c)(2) of the Commu-
nications Act of 1934 (47 U.S.C. 230(e)(2)).
‘‘(4) INTERNET.—The term ‘Internet’ has the
meaning given that term in section 230(c)(1) of the
Communications Act of 1934 (47 U.S.C. 230(c)(1)).
‘‘(5) INTERNET DOMAIN.—The term ‘Internet
domain’ refers to a specific computer system (com-
monly referred to as a ‘host’) or collection of com-
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‘‘(A) electronic mail sent by persons to re-
cipients with whom they have a direct or indi-
rect relationship, including a prior business re-
lationship; or
‘‘(B) mail sent by a source to a recipient
where such recipient, or someone authorized by
him, has at any time affirmatively requested
communications from that source.’’.
SEC. 4. EFFECTIVE DATE.
The provisions of this Act shall take effect 45 days
after the date of enactment of this Act.
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