Spam Arrest

Spam Arrest is a spam-filtering company that supplies a service to subscribers, promising to cut down drastically on spam. It works as follows:

The system requires the sender to enter a pattern of letters (a CAPTCHA) to release an email. That sounds reasonable, but this release mechanism means the sender has automatically agreed to Spam Arrest's licence agreement, printed in very small text and spaced so you have to scroll down to see it.

By agreeing, the sender also indemnifies the company to the tune of $2,000 for every single email they allow which the company (not the sender) deems to be spam. The sender doesn't waive their right of appeal, but agrees that disputes have to be dealt with under US legal jurisdiction, with all that implies in terms of US legal costs.

This might be an unenforceable contract in the UK, but anyone caught by it could struggle to travel anywhere under US jurisdiction if the company unilaterally decided that spam had been sent, unless they were in a position to appeal any judgement.

This particular company is called Spam Arrest, but there are others that work similarly.

Some community moderators have decided to ban members using Spam Arrest and other spam-filtering companies, considering it an unnecessary risk to their members who might reply to messages.

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