Commercial Emails
Commercial Emails and Text Messages Regulation
Certain aspects of how customers of online veders utilize the vendor’s platforms are subject to regulations in the United States, European Union and elsewhere. In recent years, U.S. and European lawmakers and regulators have expressed concern over the use of third-party cookies or web beacons for online behavioral advertising, and legislation adopted recently in the European Union requires informed consent for the placement of a cookie on a user’s device. Regulation of cookies and web beacons may lead to restrictions on platform online vendors activities, such as efforts to understand users’ Internet usage.
New and expanding “Do Not Track” regulations have recently been enacted or proposed that protect users’ right to choose whether or not to be tracked online. These regulations seek, among other things, to allow end users to have greater control over the use of private information collected online, to forbid the collection or use of online information, to demand a business to comply with their choice to opt out of such collection or use, and to place limits upon the disclosure of information to third party websites. These policies could have a significant impact on the operation of the vendor’s platforms.
Many of companies providing online services or online information in the healthcare, financial services and other industries are subject to substantial regulation regarding their collection, use and protection of data and may be the subject of further regulation in the future. Accordingly, these laws or significant new laws or regulations or changes in, or repeals of, existing laws, regulations or governmental policy may change the way these customers do business and may require online vendors, including online marketing vendors, to implement additional features or offer additional contractual terms to satisfy customer and regulatory requirements, or could cause the demand for and sales of our inbound platform to decrease and adversely impact our financial results.
In the United States, the Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act of 2003, or the CAN-SPAM Act, establishes certain requirements for commercial email messages and specifies penalties for the transmission of commercial email messages that are intended to deceive the recipient as to source or content. The CAN-SPAM Act, among other things, obligates the sender of commercial emails to provide recipients with the ability to opt out of receiving future commercial emails from the sender. The ability of online business players’ message recipients to opt out of receiving commercial emails may minimize the effectiveness of the email components of our inbound platform.
In some U.S. states and foreign jurisdictions, such as Australia, Canada and the European Union, there are enacted laws that regulate sending email, and some of these laws are more restrictive than United State laws. For example, some foreign laws prohibit sending unsolicited email unless the recipient has provided the sender advance consent to receipt of such email, or in other words has “opted-in” to receiving it. A requirement that recipients opt into, or the ability of recipients to opt out of, receiving commercial emails may minimize the effectiveness of some marketig vendors platforms.
While these laws and regulations generally govern the TOS regarding the use of online platforms, the owners of such platforms may be subject to certain laws as a data processor on behalf of, or as a business associate of, their clients. For example, laws and regulations governing the collection, use and disclosure of personal information include, in the United States, rules and regulations promulgated under the authority of the Federal Trade Commission, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999 and state breach notification laws, and internationally, the Data Protection Directive in the European Union and the Federal Data Protection Act in Germany.
When online business are found to be in violation of any of these laws or regulations as a result of government enforcement or private litigation, they could be subjected to civil and criminal sanctions, including both monetary fines and injunctive action.