e-marketing, unsolicited commercial e-mail, and legal solutions

The purpose of this paper is to explore the legal solutions to unsolicited commercial e-mail. The advantages of e-mail enable it to be one of the most important e-marketing instruments. Spammers are also motivated by potential profits in spamming. The low costs and high benefits of the spammers, and the high costs and low benefits of the spammed determine the illegal nature of the spamming. The spam poses challenges for e-mail recipients' property rights, fair trade, public morals, cybersecurity, personal data protection, and involves other concerns as well. In dealing with spam, technical and marketing solutions cannot work alone without the legal mechanisms. The legal regulation is justified by balancing the interest between senders, service providers and even users. Criminal sanctions, civil remedies, and international harmonization are alternative steps in establishing legal solutions. As a necessary part of the legislation, punishment for unsolicited commercial e-mails should be more severe. Still, there are a number of limitations to the effectiveness of law enforcement against spamming. Spam must be eliminated by comprehensive mechanisms.