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| The European Union is trying to crack down on
spam |
The European Union has asked nine member nations that have
failed to adopt anti-spam legislation to describe what they intend
to do to comply with the law.
France, Germany, Belgium, Finland, Greece, Luxembourg, the
Netherlands, Portugal, and Sweden will face possible court action
unless they provide an explanation within two months.
The new law aims to protect businesses by banning companies from
sending unsolicited email, and stealing personal data from
websites.
The EU hopes to eradicate unwanted spam email, but leaves it up
to member nations to decide how spam should be stopped and how
spammers should be punished.
Austria, Denmark, Ireland, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom
have taken steps to adopt the EU law. The British version becomes
law on Thursday 11 December.
"Spammers can cloak their identity and work from anywhere in the
world, and some might argue that because most spam originates from
the USA that European laws against it are pointless," said Graham
Cluley, senior technology consultant for Sophos. "However, all
countries should look carefully at what measures they are taking to
outlaw spam. By working in unison and developing strict anti-spam
laws we can make life for the spammers that little bit harder."
Sophos recommends companies protect themselves with a consolidated solution which can defend
businesses from the threats of both spam and viruses.
More than 100 million users in 150 countries rely on Sophos as the best protection against complex threats and data loss. Sophos is committed to providing security and data protection solutions that are simple to manage, deploy and use and that deliver the industry's lowest total cost of ownership. Sophos offers award-winning encryption, endpoint security, web, email, and network access control solutions backed by SophosLabs - a global network of threat intelligence centers. With more than two decades of experience, Sophos is regarded as a leader in security and data protection by top analyst firms and has received many industry awards.
Sophos is headquartered in Boston, US and Oxford, UK. More information is available at www.sophos.com.