[Congressional Bills 108th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[S. 1052 Introduced in Senate (IS)]






108th CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                S. 1052

  To ensure that recipients of unsolicited bulk commercial electronic 
  mail can identify the sender of such electronic mail, and for other 
                               purposes.


_______________________________________________________________________


                   IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

                              May 13, 2003

 Mr. Nelson of Florida introduced the following bill; which was read 
        twice and referred to the Committee on Commerce, Science, and 
        TransportationYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
  To ensure that recipients of unsolicited bulk commercial electronic 
  mail can identify the sender of such electronic mail, and for other 
                               purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Ban on Deceptive Unsolicited Bulk 
Electronic Mail Act of 2003''.

SEC. 2. DECEPTIVE UNSOLICITED ELECTRONIC MAIL.

    (a) Violations.--It shall be unlawful for any person to knowingly 
and intentionally use a computer or computer network to--
            (1) falsify or forge electronic mail transmission 
        information or other source, destination, routing, or subject 
        heading information in any manner in connection with the 
        transmission of unsolicited bulk commercial electronic mail 
        through, or into, the computer network of an electronic mail 
        service provider or its subscribers;
            (2) transmit an electronic mail message to a recipient who 
        requests not to receive unsolicited bulk commercial electronic 
        mail; or
            (3) collect electronic mail addresses from public and 
        private spaces for the purpose of transmitting unsolicited bulk 
        commercial electronic mail.
    (b) Penalty.--Any violation of subsection (a) shall be--
            (1) considered a predicate offense for the purposes of 
        applying the Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organization 
        Act (RICO) (18 U.S.C. 1961 et seq.);
            (2) constitute an unfair or deceptive act or practice in 
        violation of section 5(a) of the Federal Trade Commission Act 
        (15 U.S.C. 45(a)); and
            (3) punishable by--
                    (A) a civil penalty; and
                    (B) a fine in accordance with title 18, United 
                States Code, or imprisonment for not more than 5 years, 
                or both.
    (c) Opportunity to Option Out of Receiving Unsolicited Mail.--Any 
person sending unsolicited bulk commercial electronic mail shall 
provide recipients of such electronic mail a clear and conspicuous 
opportunity to request not to receive future unsolicited electronic 
mail.
    (d) Definitions.--In this section:
            (1) Electronic mail message.--The term ``electronic mail 
        message'' means a message sent to an electronic mail address.
            (2) Electronic mail address.--The term ``electronic mail 
        address'' means a destination, commonly expressed as a string 
        of characters, consisting of a unique user name or mailbox 
        (commonly referred to as the ``local part'') and a reference to 
        an Internet domain (commonly referred to as the ``domain 
        part'') to which an electronic mail message can be sent or 
        delivered.
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