Lead Detector Compliance
Introduction. Using existing technology (referred to herein as a “Technology”), companies are able to obtain email addresses of visitors to websites who have not and do not disclose their email address to the website owner. This Summary discusses some of the legal issues relating to use of this technology.
CAN-SPAM
The CPRA, a ballot initiative passed by voters in November 2020, amends the CCPA and renames the CCPA to the CPRA. The CPRA includes additional privacy protections for consumers as discussed below.
On its website homepage, a user of the Technology should provide a clear and conspicuous link titled “Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information” that enables a user to opt-out of the sharing of a visitor’s personal information.
OPT-OUT AND COMPLYING WITH THE CAN-SPAM ACT
Disclaimer. This summary is intended solely for informational purposes and is not intended to constitute legal advice.. If you have questions about complying with the CAN-SPAM Act you should contact your legal counsel.
- Introduction. The CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 establishes requirements for companies that send commercial emails. The law covers email whose primary purpose is advertising or promoting a commercial product or service. This includes content on a Website. A “transactional or relationship message” – an email that facilitates an agreed-upon transaction or updates a customer in an existing business relationship – may not contain false or misleading routing information, but otherwise is exempt from most provisions of the Act. Violations of the Act can result in civil fines and criminal liability. The Act applies to consumer and business recipients and makes no exceptions for business-to-business emails.
- Commercial Emails v. Transactional or Relationship Emails. The requirements of the CAN-SPAM Act differ based on whether the email is (1) a “commercial” email or (2) a “transactional or relationship email.” An email is “commercial” if the primary purpose of the email is the commercial advertisement or promotion of a commercial product or service (including content on an Internet website operated for a commercial purpose). A “transactional or relationship” email facilitates a commercial transaction (e.g., purchase of products or services) that the recipient has previously entered into, or to provide information relating to a product or service already purchased by the recipient from the sender, such as warranty or recall information or account balances. Most requirements and prohibitions of the Act apply only to commercial messages, but the Act does prohibit both commercial and transactional / relationship messages from containing false or misleading routing information (e.g., the source, destination, originating email address, “from” line, etc.).
- Prior Consent / Opt-In Not Required. Opt-Out Mechanisms and Procedures. Prior express consent or opt-in consent is not required in order to send commercial emails. Commercial emails may not, however, be sent to recipients who have opted-out or unsubscribed from receiving commercial emails from the sender.
- Opt-Out Rather than Opt-In. While some jurisdictions outside of the United States (e.g. the European Union and Canada) require opt-in an order to send marketing or commercial emails, the US has been an opt-out jurisdiction since the passage of CAN- This means marketing emails can be sent to recipients unless and until they have opted out of receiving marketing emails from the sender.
Section 7704(a)(3)[1] of the Act requires that marketing messages contain an opt-out or unsubscribe mechanism:
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(3) Inclusion of return address or comparable mechanism in commercial electronic mail
(A) In general, it is unlawful for any person to initiate the transmission to a protected computer of a commercial electronic mail message that does not contain a functioning return electronic mail address or other Internet-based mechanism, clearly and conspicuously displayed, that—
Section 7704(a)(4) of the Act states the opt out requirements:
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(4) Prohibition of transmission of commercial electronic mail after objection
(A) IN GENERAL, if a recipient makes a request using a mechanism provided pursuant to paragraph (3) not to receive some or any commercial electronic mail messages from such sender, then it is unlawful:
- Don’t use false or misleading header information. Your “From,” “To,” “Reply-To,” and routing information – including the originating domain name and email address – must be accurate and identify the person or business who initiated the message.
- Don’t use deceptive subject lines. The subject line must accurately reflect the content of the message.
- Identify the message as an ad. The law gives you a lot of leeway in how to do this, but you must disclose clearly and conspicuously that your message is an advertisement.
- Tell recipients where you’re located. Your message must include your valid physical postal address. This can be your current street address, a post office box you’ve registered with the U.S. Postal Service, or a private mailbox you’ve registered with a commercial mail receiving agency established under Postal Service regulations.
- Tell recipients how to opt out of receiving future email from you. Your message must include a clear and conspicuous explanation of how the recipient can opt out of getting email from you in the future. Craft the notice in a way that’s easy for an ordinary person to recognize, read, and understand. Creative use of type size, color, and location can improve clarity. Give a return email address or another easy Internet-based way to allow people to communicate their choice to you. You may create a menu to allow a recipient to opt out of certain types of messages, but you must include the option to stop all commercial messages from you. Make sure your spam filter doesn’t block these opt-out requests.
- Honor opt-out requests promptly. Any opt-out mechanism you offer must be able to process opt-out requests for at least 30 days after you send your message. You must honor a recipient’s opt-out request within 10 business days. You can’t charge a fee, require the recipient to give you any personally identifying information beyond an email address, or make the recipient take any step other than sending a reply email or visiting a single page on an Internet website as a condition for honoring an opt-out request. Once people have told you they don’t want to receive more messages from you, you can’t sell or transfer their email addresses, even in the form of a mailing list. The only exception is that you may transfer the addresses to a company you’ve hired to help you comply with the CAN-SPAM Act.
- Monitor what others are doing on your behalf. The law makes clear that even if you hire another company to handle your email marketing, you can’t contract away your legal responsibility to comply with the law. Both the company whose product is promoted in the message and the company that actually sends the message may be held legally responsible.
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5. Message Routing / Header Information Cannot Contain False or Misleading Information. The “From,” “To,” and routing information on a commercial email – including the originating domain name and email address – must be accurate and identify the person who initiated the email. As noted above, this applies to commercial as well as transactional / relationship emails.
6. Subject Lines May Not Be Deceptive. The subject line should be clear, truthful and accurate, and cannot be misleading to the recipient about the content or subject matter of the message.
7. Identification of Postal Address. A commercial email must include the sender’s valid physical postal address, which can be a post office box or private mailbox.
8. Multiple Senders / Advertisers. In the event two or more advertisers desire to send an email including content on behalf of each advertiser (e.g., a joint-marketing arrangement), the advertisers must designate one of them as the sender that must honor opt-out requests and satisfy the other statutory obligations. Then sender must be the only person identified in the “from” line of the email and must comply with all requirements under the Act. Even though there is one sender, all other advertisers are still responsible for compliance under the Act. Accordingly, each advertiser should carefully review and assess the compliance of the joint email, investigate the reputation of the sender, and take appropriate steps to ensure the sender’s compliance with the Act, including the all opt-out requests.
9. No Sexually-Explicit Material. The email should not include sexually-explicit material. The Act provides additional requirements for labeling, disclaimers and presentation of emails with sexually-explicit content.
10. No Harvesting or Automatic Email Generation. Senders should not use automated means to gather or “harvest” email addresses from third party web sites with terms that or randomly generating possible email addresses.
[1] 15 USC § 7704(a)(3)
[2] https://www.ftc.gov/tips-advice/business-center/guidance/can-spam-act-compliance-guide-business
Here How It FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS REGARDING THE CALIFORNIA CONSUMER PRIVACY ACT
Updated: March 18, 2021
Disclaimer. These FAQs regarding the California Privacy Rights Act (CPRA), amending and renaming the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) are intended solely for informational purposes and is not intended to constitute legal advice or to create an attorney-client relationship between Foley & Lardner and any recipient or reader of this summary. This is not intended to be an exhaustive summary of all requirements of the CPRA. If you have questions about complying with the CPRA, you should contact your legal counsel.
The CPRA, a ballot initiative passed by voters in November 2020, amends the CCPA and renames the law. Frequently asked questions relating to the CPRA are discussed below.
- Who does the CPRA apply to?
The CPRA applies to any business— a for-profit legal entity — that collects and sells consumer “personal information”, with a few exemptions discussed below. The law sets a floor in terms of revenue and the number of consumer records being processed for the CPRA to kick in. A company has to meet one or more of the following for the CPRA to apply:
- What if we are not located and have no facilities in California?
If you collect personal information from residents of the State of California while they are in California you are likely doing business in California. Thus the law would apply to you if your company satisfies any of the applicability triggers discussed above.
- What qualifies as “personal information” under the CPRA?
The CPRA defines personal information broadly to include information that can identify, relate to, describe, be associated with, or be reasonably capable of being associated with, or could reasonably be linked, directly or indirectly with a particular consumer or household. The CPRA’s private right of action provision relating to data breaches incorporates a narrower definition of personal information (discussed below).
The law identifies a non-exhaustive list of categories of personal information, including:
The definition also pulls in inferences from personal information used to create a profile about a consumer that would reflect the person’s preferences, characteristics, psychological trends, predispositions, behavior, attitudes, intelligence, abilities, and aptitudes. Thus, for example, businesses that leverage artificial intelligence (AI) to help determine consumer preferences or identify preferred job candidates must look more carefully at what personal information they may maintain about their consumers (including employees) for purposes of CPRA.
Personal information does not include de-identified or aggregate consumer information.
- Does the CPRA apply to protected health information governed by HIPAA and other medical or health information?
Personal information does not include protected health information (PHI) governed by HIPAA or medical information under California’s Medical Information Act (CMIA). Additionally, the CPRA exempts an organization that “maintains patient information in the same manner” as PHI under HIPAA. Thus, to the extent the data involved includes were arguably could include any PHI or medical information under the CMIA.
- Does the CPRA apply to employee (or independent contractor personnel) information?
Employee (including independent contractor) related data is excluded from most provisions of the CPRA until January 1, 2023. Employers do, however, need to provide a brief privacy notice to employees regarding the nature of personal information collected, for what purposes, and a general description of who it is disclosed to (e.g. service providers).
- What rights do consumers have under the CPRA?
The new rights under the CPRA are similar to many contained in the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation. The CPRA gives California residents the right to request that a business:
Probably; if the law applies to you. The CPRA has added several new substantive elements to the required disclosures that must be included in a privacy notice or policy. In addition to the information that must be included under the existing California laws or provided pursuant to California’s “Shine the Light” law, online privacy policies must include:
- For the “do not sell” opt-out, what constitutes the “sale” of personal information?
A “sale” of personal information under the CPRA is defined broadly to include the “selling, renting, releasing, disclosing, disseminating, making available, transferring, or otherwise communicating orally, in writing, or by electronic or other means” the personal information of a Consumer to another business or third party “for monetary or other valuable consideration.”
This broad definition suggests that if personal information is provided as part of a larger business relationship, a “sale” may have occurred even if no amounts are paid directly for the data itself. In addition, a website may be “selling” personal information by passing such information to third-party ad networks through cookies.
- What would NOT be considered a “sale” of personal information?
The law provides a non-exhaustive list of examples which would not be considered a sale of personal information:
- For the “do not share” opt-out, what constitutes the “sharing” of personal information for “cross-context behavioral information”?
“Sharing” of personal information under the CPRA is defined broadly to include the “sharing, renting, releasing, disclosing, disseminating, making available, transferring, or otherwise communicating orally, In writing, or by electronic or other means, a consumer’s personal information by the business to a third party for cross-context behavioral advertising, whether or not for monetary or other valuable consideration, including transactions between a business and a third party for cross-context behavioral advertising for the benefit of a business In which no money is exchanged.”
“Cross-context behavioral advertising” means the targeting of advertising to a consumer based on the consumer’s personal Information obtained from the consumer’s activity across businesses, distinctly-branded websites, applications, or services, other than the business, distinctly-branded website, application, or service with which the consumer intentionally Interacts.
The new definition of “sharing” makes it clear that the disclosure of personal information (including unique identifiers in cookies) for targeted advertising with or without consideration will be subject to the rights of a consumer to opt-out of such a disclosure.
- What would NOT be considered “sharing” personal information?
The law provides limited exclusions from “sharing” under the CPRA, including:
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