Create an e-annoyance, go to jail

[Shun]

"It's no joke. Last Thursday, President Bush signed into law a prohibition on posting annoying Web messages or sending annoying e-mail messages without disclosing your true identity.

In other words, it's OK to flame someone on a mailing list or in a blog as long as you do it under your real name. Thank Congress for small favors, I guess."

Columns url: http://news.com.com/Create+an+e-annoyance%2C+go+to+jail/2010-1028_3-6022491.html?tag=nl
FAQ url: http://news.com.com/FAQ+The+new+annoy+law+explained/2100-1028_3-6025396.html?tag=nefd.top

So, are you using your real name here?

In case you are not aware, Shun is my last name in Chinese PinYin, so I'm free to anony anyone here, ha ha ha..., :D

[carcomptoy]

That should be good...I know a friend of mine who was being harrassed by an unknown person...

[Jose_R.A.M]

How exactly are they gonna regulate this?

Does that mean that idiot spammers could get sent to jail too?

[Shun]

That's why it is interesting, and it is regarded as "High Impact" on News.com, :)

In the FAQ:-

Q: I read a post by Dan Solove that says the law is just antiharassment, so we shouldn't be worried. Is he right?

Solove, who's a law professor at George Washington University, says: "'Annoy' is part of the intent element of the statute--it requires the intent to annoy, abuse, threaten or harass. Far from an antianonymity provision that applies whenever a person annoys another, it is merely a prohibition on harassment."

If all the law did was target harassment, nobody would care. Instead, it also restricts certain behaviors that "annoy."

Most people realize there's a difference between annoying someone and harassing them. If I stalk someone, impersonate them in chat rooms, and repeatedly call them at 3 a.m. and hang up, that's harassment. Nobody's arguing that should be legal.

But annoyance? If I set up an incendiary Web site that has a single purpose--say, to annoy some politician I dislike--that should be permissible. That's why the law is far more than an "antiharassment" law.


Q: It's not enough for someone to find the site annoying. I have to intend for it to be annoying, right?

Correct. The relevant section of the law uses the phrase "without disclosing his identity and with intent to annoy." A thin-skinned reader becoming irrationally annoyed shouldn't be sufficient to trigger criminal liability.


Q: The law criminalizes certain Internet actions done to "annoy, abuse, threaten, or harass any person." That means someone has to do all four things, right?

Nope. It's an or connector, not an and connector. Violating any one of the four prohibitions would be unlawful.