Patrick Leahy: “it is increasingly apparent that unwanted commercial e-mail, commonly known as ``spam,'' is more than just a nuisance.…”

“it is increasingly apparent that unwanted commercial e-mail, commonly known as ``spam,'' is more than just a nuisance. In the past few years, it has become a serious and growing problem that threatens to undermine the vast potential of the Internet. Businesses and individuals currently wade through tremendous amounts of spam in order to access e-mail that is of relevance to them--and this is after ISPs, businesses, and individuals have spent time and money blocking a large percentage of spam from reaching its intended recipients. In my home State of Vermont, one legislator recently found that two-thirds of the 96 e-mails in his inbox were spam. And this occurred after the legislature had installed new spam-blocking software on its computer system that seemed to be catching 80 percent of the spam. The assistant attorney general in Vermont was forced to suggest to computer users the following means to avoid these unsolicited commercial e-mails: ``It's very bad to reply, even to say don't send anymore. It tells the spammer they have a live address . . . The best thing you can do is just keep deleting them. If it gets really bad, you may have to change your address.''”