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CASL, the Canadian Anti Spam Legislation, has had its fair share of detractors. The law, which came into effect on July 1st<\/sup>, was first passed by Canadian Parliament in 2010, and since then, it\u2019s struggled to become a big boy and leave the nest, mostly because the ruling Conservative Party of Canada, which authored and passed the bill, forget to tell their friends \u2013 big business \u2013 that they could face stiff fines for bugging people via email. A large part of the criticism has been over the way the Stephen Harper-led government bragged about CASL and how it\u2019s the toughest of its kind in the world, while failing to point out that Canada is the last G-8 nation to have such a law (the US and Australia anti spam laws have been in effect since the early 2000s).<\/p>\nThen there was the lobbying by big business. Large media companies like Bell Media didn\u2019t like the idea that they\u2019d be subject to laws that were meant for the \u2018little people,\u2019 apparently. The government caved, allowing several \u2018public consultations\u2019 to occur, and those consultations were the ammo the government needed to water down the legislation.<\/p>\n
Then there was the ongoing slamming of Canada\u2019s law, suggesting that it was confusing and that it targeted the wrong people<\/a>. There were criticisms over CASL\u2019s ability to target and penalize<\/a> the true source of spam. There was, of course, the waiting<\/a>. The long road of mindless talking, with no action.<\/p>\n There was panic<\/a> when the live date for the law was announced. Companies and other organizations scrambled to understand what their responsibilities were, what they needed to do to become compliant, and of course, they had to contact everyone on their mailing lists. Finally, there was a simple yet haunting piece of truth, embedded in the words<\/a> of Internet and privacy lawyer David Fraser, as he called the new law \u201ca mess.\u201d<\/p>\n With such impressive beginnings, one couldn\u2019t help but wonder what the first year of a CASL-enabled world would look like, and as might have been predicted, we didn\u2019t need a year to decide that Mr. Fraser\u2019s words were prophetic in an epic manner. In a recent article by the Thompson Citizen<\/a>, it\u2019s discussed how companies are coming to grips with the new law while political parties get a pass when it comes to spam in Canada. The reason that might be, suggests the Citizen, is that the Conservative government knows full-well that there\u2019s a general election in Canada in 2015. Wouldn\u2019t it be embarrassing if Prime Minister Harper\u2019s own party was dinged with a big old fine by the monster it created?<\/p>\n The Citizen points out how businesses, not spammers, are the true losers in Canada\u2019s war on spam, describing the law as \u201ccosting Canadian businesses millions to implement but\u2026few believe [it] will put any kind of dent in phishing scams and spam.\u201d Fines for CASL infringement have maximums of $1 million for personal violations to $10 million for organizational infractions, not chump change, not even for those aforementioned big corporations. Realistically, the article points out, those maximums won\u2019t be used much, save for only the worst offenders.<\/p>\n Patricia Valladao, a spokesperson for the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) \u2013 the organization tasked with enforcing the law \u2013 says that the law isn\u2019t meant to be a hammer. \u201cOur objective is not to punish but rather to achieve compliance in the most efficient way possible while preventing recidivism,\u201d she told the Citizen.<\/p>\n But the government of Canada doesn\u2019t seem to understand that punishment has begun without a single fine being levied. Canadian companies, the Citizen says, \u201cneed not be fined to have CASL hit them in the pocketbooks. The Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB) estimates it is costing small and medium-sized businesses in Canada between $30,000 and $50,000 to become compliant with CASL.\u201d And that is definitely not chump change for small companies, which constitute a significant portion of businesses in Canada.<\/p>\n In addition to the hard costs associated with becoming compliant, there\u2019s another direct penalty that companies are experiencing, and this penalty could cost much more than $50,000. Businesses \u201care also losing significant volumes of business contacts, thanks to CASL\u2019s requirement that businesses get implied or express consent of recipients to send any kind of electronic message that has a commercial intent. Businesses had until July 1 to get the express consent of their subscribers and business contacts.\u201d<\/p>\n