Yesterday, I received an email from Microsoft Canada letting me know that Canada's new anti-spam legislation is coming into effect July 1st 2014. What I needed to do was to confirm I wanted to continue receiving email newsletters from them.
This was the first I had heard about the new legislation (but I am not 'up' on all the news anyway), so I looked into it. Here is the government website:
About the Law - Canada's Anti-Spam Legislation
Here are some of the highlights:
When the new law is in force, it will generally prohibit the:
- sending of commercial electronic messages without the recipient's consent (permission), including messages to email addresses and social networking accounts, and text messages sent to a cell phone;
- alteration of transmission data in an electronic message which results in the message being delivered to a different destination without express consent;
- installation of computer programs without the express consent of the owner of the computer system or its agent, such as an authorized employee;
- use of false or misleading representations online in the promotion of products or services;
- collection of personal information through accessing a computer system in violation of federal law (e.g. the Criminal Code of Canada); and
- collection of electronic addresses by the use of computer programs or the use of such addresses, without permission (address harvesting).
