Future of Spam

Recently I was looking for information about the predicted future of email spam, and I had a hard time finding any articles that gave any concrete information on how spam emails may infiltrate our lives in the future. Maybe that’s because it may not be strictly email spam that we’ll be dodging.

I wonder if the CAN-SPAM Act and the Telephone Consumer Protection Act will intersect in the near future. The more consumers use their cell phones as mobile media devices, the more email and telephone services will converge.

As mentioned in my coworker, Paul Bourdeaux’s blogs, “When Good SMS Messages Go Bad – Satterfield v Simon & Schuster revisited” and “Another Court Decision Strengthens TCPA Against Mobile Spam” the world of mobile marketing is getting hit with lawsuits, too. Some of the same rules apply to both email and mobile spam, such as keeping consumer opt-in information clearly visible and the unsubscribe process quick and simple.

So maybe the future of spam is going to include inbox invasion and getting even more personal and direct, attacking our phones and other mobile devices.