Newsgroups: news.admin.net-abuse.email
Subject: Hypertouch Sues BobVila.com in Nation's First CAN-SPAM Case
Date: 4 Mar 2004 12:28:20 -0800
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NNTP-Posting-Date: Thu, 4 Mar 2004 20:28:21 +0000 (UTC)

Hypertouch Sues BobVila.com in Nation's First CAN-SPAM Case 

FOSTER CITY, Calif. -- The operator of home improvement guru Bob
Vila's website today became the nation's first target of the new
federal anti-spam law, according to attorney John L. Fallat.

Fallat filed a lawsuit in federal court on behalf of Foster City-based
Internet Service Provider Hypertouch, Inc., alleging Sacramento-based
BlueStream Media and Boston-based BVWebTies LLC, owner of BobVila.com,
violated the Federal CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 by sending Hypertouch and
its customers unwanted and unsolicited electronic mail advertisements
for Bob Vila's "Home Again Newsletter."

"The CAN-SPAM Act provides only the most minimal protections to the
public," says Hypertouch President and Founder Joe Wagner. "But
BobVila.com and BlueStream Media failed to observe even those." The
suit alleges that the defendants sent spam email advertisements with
fraudulent headers and no legally required physical address. They also
sent email to randomly generated and harvested addresses, even to
addresses that had been submitted to the "opted-out" links of other
spam.

"Most Internet Service Providers (ISPs) advise their customers to
never reply to a spam in an attempt to 'opt-out' because that will
only confirm for the spammer that an email address is 'live,'" said
Wagner. "BobVila.com and BlueStream Media's actions graphically show
how harmful the CAN-SPAM Act is by requiring recipients to reply to
the spam they receive."

"While ultimately we feel that the CAN-SPAM is an open license to spam
with very little protection for the public, we will zealously use what
few protections are available to punish unrepentant spammers," said
Fallat. "We want to send a strong message to other would-be spammers,
and the companies that hire them."

"BobVila.com even refused to assure Hypertouch that they would never
use BlueStream Media in the future," Wagner added. "I cannot
understand why any legitimate business would run the tremendous legal
and public relations risk in harassing millions of people with spam."

Anyone who has information about the marketing and/or business
practices of BobVila.com or BlueStream Media is invited to contact
attorney John Fallat at 415-457-3773 or email him at
jfallat@fallat.com. Additional information is available at
http://legal.hypertouch.com.