France’s CNIL Releases Spam Survey Findings

In a recent survey, the Commission Nationale Informatique et Libertés (CNIL) questioned Internet professionals and
associations on what they felt should be the rules and principles to fight against spamming.

The CNIL report on mail merging and the protection of personal
data concerns regarding phone, fax and regular mail merging as well as e-mail mass mailings or spamming.

The commission found that the groups agreed on some basic principles. Users want to require that e-mail available on public Internet areas, such as chat
areas or newsgroups, are not intended to be used for any commercial,
religious or political posting and should not be used as such without authorization.

The CNIL also indicated to the WC3 that it is important to prevent the
robots from collecting information via the Internet.

The commission would also like to publish messages on various Web sites in
order to remind surfers that it is forbidden to use
personal data for any consumer prospecting.

Finally, the commission wants to ensure that the Platform for
Privacy Preference Project (P3P), a protocol in development, allow users to protest electronically against this kind of personal data hacking.

CNIL also called upon the European directive agreed upon on October 24, 1995, which concluded that no prospecting can be done without the consent
of the consumer.