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BestPrac.Org
Stop Spam : Best Practice in Email
Spam Prevention and Eradication
Principles of Best Practice -
Web Masters / Web Designers:
Summary
Web Designers are exhorted to utilize available technology to protect themselves and their website visitors & users from spammers. Spammers frequently use automated "bots" to spider/crawl websites to harvest email addresses for spamming purposes. Web Masters and Designers should ensure that their sites are not capable of supplying email addresses to automated harvesters.
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| Ref # |
Principle or Proposed Principle
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| WMD001 |
Webmasters and Web Designers should take all steps possible to ensure that no email address (whether belonging to themselves or otherwise) appears on their website in a manner susceptible to harvesting by automated means. |
| WMD002 |
Webmasters and Web Designers should maintain a page on each website, readily accessible and easy to locate, which outlines the policy of that site in relation to spammers spamming email addresses belonging to that domain. The policy should clearly state the conditions under which email sent to addresses at or related to that site or domain is and is not welcomed, the rights of action reserved by the webmaster/domain owner, and the range of consequences offenders of the policy may encounter. |
| WMD003 |
Where a website contains interactive forums (including but not limited to chat rooms, message boards, classified advertisements, guest books, and similar), the Webmaster / Web Designer should ensure that the privacy of the email addresses of all users is protected, by non-publication of such email addresses (except where the user has voluntarily added their email address in the body of their message/s, unless the Terms of Service of the particular forum prohibit such content by users).
If the nature of such an interactive forum is to encourage off-forum contact between participants, initial contact between participants should be via either:
- a web-form script, with the delivery of the contents of that form to the recipient to include the IP and timestamp details of the sender;
- a time-limited email redirection service; or
- other such technology or moderation to protect the email address of the recipient from public access.
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| WMD004 |
Where a website accepts third-party advertising within it's site, the Webmaster/Web Designer should conduct "due diligence" on all intending advertisers to ensure, to the best of their reasonable abilities, that:
- a) The advertiser does not have a known history of spamming or other forms of net abuse; and
- b) The advertiser is promoting a legitimate product or service, not in violation of the Terms of Service of their own, or the Publication's own, service providers, and not of a type which may reasonably be suspected of falling within a category listed by the US Federal Trade Commission as a "Top Ten Dot Con".
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| WMD005 |
In choosing a web hosting service, Webmasters/Web Designers should conduct such "due diligence" as to assure themselves that the service they choose is not a "spam friendly" service. Such "due diligence" should include, yet go beyond merely examining the Terms of Service / Acceptable Use Policies and Privacy Policies of the hosting service. Examination should include (though not be limited to) inclusion/exclusion from various blacklists, newsgroup commentaries regarding enforcement/non-enforcement of such Terms of Service, and search of various websites specialising in maintaining databases of "spam friendly" hosting services.
(Examples not forming part of this Principle:
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| WMD006 |
As the functions of many websites may fall into more than just one category of the Principles of Best Practice in Email Spam Prevention and Eradication, Webmasters and Web Designers must ensure that the websites they design or for which they are responsible comply with the Principles of Best Practice for all categories relevant to the website. |
| WMD007 |
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| WMD008 |
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| WMD009 |
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| WMD010 |
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| WMD011 |
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| WMD012 |
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