Question 6: What information must commercial electronic messages contain?

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Question 6: What information must commercial electronic messages contain?

Answer:

The Spam Act requires that businesses include the following information in each  commercial electronic message that they send you:

• the name of their business
• their business address and telephone number
• electronic contact details (such as an email address or fax number) and
• that you can unsubscribe from future messages (see What can I do to stop a business sending me spam?)

If a business does not include this information, it is probably a 'spam' message and in breach of the Spam Act.  It may also breach the Privacy Act (see, How does the Privacy Act apply to commercial electronic messages and spam?).

You should also remember that only a small percentage of 'spam traffic' is generated in Australia and a lot of spam is sent randomly , often to promote scams like 'phishing'.  It will generally be difficult for the Spam Act or Privacy Act to offer protections against spam sent from dubious overseas sources.  For this type of spam, you should consider installing "SpamMATTERS" from the Australian Communications and Media Authority.  While this is not a spam filter, this software reports spam emails to ACMA so as to help in the fight against spam.  More information on this is available at www.spam.acma.gov.au.

More information

• For more information about spam and the Privacy Act, see Information Sheet 26.
• Detailed information about the Spam Act and reporting spam (SpamMATTERS) is also available from the Australian Communications and Media Authority at http://www.spam.acma.gov.au.

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