Gates Takes A Bite Out Of Spam

Bill Gates couldn't be in Washington, D.C., for a congressional hearing on the E-mail spam epidemic yesterday, but he made his presence felt. In a letter to the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, Gates said that "the torrent of unwanted, unsolicited, often offensive and sometimes fraudulent email is eroding trust in technology" and declared that a multifaceted approach, including technological solutions, industry self-regulation, legislation, and enforcement, was needed to combat the growing problem.

Gates suggested such steps as establishing a global authority for developing industry best practices in self-regulation, coupled with certification programs and incentives for E-mail marketers who get certified as trusted senders by employing those best practices. He also recommended encouraging marketers to do so by creating an Federal Trade Commission safe harbor in which certified marketers would be granted regulatory benefits, such as exemption from having to include an "ADV" label in E-mail subject lines.

Most observers agree with Gates that while anti-spam legislation is sorely needed, it's also unlikely to be effective by itself. Michael Osterman, principal analyst with Osterman Research, says proposed spam legislation typically starts with the best intentions but eventually gets watered down because of concerns that free enterprise is being constricted. He estimates that legislation will solve perhaps 2% of the problem by targeting the most high-profile spammers but that the typical spammer will fly under the legislative radar.

Osterman believes that because spammers will continue their relentless onslaught so long as they can generate significant profits with negligible expenses, technology is the single most effective spam-fighting tool. "The economics of spam are seriously out of whack," he says. Current spam filters that typically block spam by 95% also reduce profitability by the same percentage, effectively making spam more expensive, and thus less profitable. "If you live in a submarine, do you really care if there's a hurricane raging outside? No," he says. "You may have a spam torrent hitting the outside of your corporate network, but with these tools, you never see it."

In his letter, Gates said Microsoft was dedicated to continuously developing the best anti-spam tools possible, and that better filters are being built every day. But he also acknowledged that more innovation was needed. "We need filtering technologies that are easier for consumers to use and more effective at determining which email messages are spam."