Email delivery systems have fast become the method of distribution for adult content, with the adult industry forecasted to bring in $12.6 billion in revenue this year, according to recent national study.
“One of the porn industry’s major marketing tools for making that enormous profit is email,” Unspam CEO Matthew Prince said. “And many of the emails they send are hitting the inboxes of children and teens.”
Prince has already helped Michigan and Utah implement Child Protection Registry laws that empower parents to block email addresses their children access from receiving adult-oriented emails.
“The law in Michigan and Utah is similar to the do-not-call list,” Prince said. “Parents simply log on to a websites run by the states in order to register the emails they wish protected. The service is completely free.”
Since the laws went into effect in 2005, thousands of parents have registered email addresses they wish to be protected from adult materials. Scores of public and private schools have also registered their school domains to block adult advertisements from classrooms.
Prince and his team have now set their sights on several other states that are prime to pass similar legislation, including Georgia, Illinois, Minnesota and Wisconsin.
“Since this is such a bi-partisan issue, most legislators are very open to either authoring or co-sponsoring child protection registry legislation,” Prince said. “In fact, we’re anticipating that [eventually] every state will have such a law on the books.”
However, while many adult companies sending emails initially complied with the laws in the two states, in mid-November, the Free Speech Coalition filed suit in Utah challenging the state’s Child Protection Registry law, stating it violates the Constitution’s free speech guarantee.
In a study conducted by Unspam, 87 percent of parents reported they are concerned about their children receiving adult spam, Prince said. Ninety-six percent also said they believe they should have the ability to block their children’s email addresses from receiving pornographic content.