US Government Departments and the Freedom of Access Act, Where is the Protection for the Subscriber?

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Those of us who work in the email marketing industry are very familiar with the dreaded CAN-SPAM act. Those of us who deal with some of the less experienced email marketers on a daily basis also know how frustrating it is when a marketer justifies their latest ‘blast’ as being “CAN-SPAM compliant”.
 
The CAN-SPAM act is Americas answer to anti-spam legislation and in a nut shell specifies that emails sent to consumers should allow subscribers to “opt out” of receiving further emails from the same organisation e.g the minimum requirement to email an individual is that an unsubscribe link must be provided and the name and address of the sending party should be readily available to the recipient.
 
Many other parts of the developed world instead specify that a consumer must “opt in” to receive marketing material for an organisation. In the “opt in” example the consumer knowingly and intentionally subscribes to a specific list/organisation for marketing materials before the marketing commences. Permission to send bulk email to the consumer does not extend beyond that organisation unless explicitly specified within the privacy policy and often through the addition of a separate check box.
 
The problem with the CAN-SPAM legislation is that it allows companies to ...