As reported in this month's issue of our newsletter, "The Silverpop Connection," new child protection laws affecting emailers go into effect in Michigan and Utah over the next three weeks. The laws establish registries of children's contact information (including email addresses) and prohibit advertisement of certain categories of products and services to those registered contact points. Both states have contracted with a vendor to run a "scrubbing service" that emailers who advertise these products and services can use to remove registered contact points from their lists. There is a significant fee for this service, and emailers must scrub their lists every 30 days. Violators face substantial criminal and civil penalties. The laws also provide for private right of action. Silverpop will hold a Q&A conference call on this topic Wednesday, July 27th at noon Eastern Time (EDT). For information on how to join the call, please see below.
Summary of Provisions
The following summary is provided for your convenience.
Please engage your legal counsel to understand the full
ramifications of these new laws for your unique business
situation.
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MICHIGAN |
UTAH |
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Start date for scrubbing lists |
August 3rd |
August 14th |
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Sample prohibited categories published by state regulatory agencies |
Alcohol, tobacco, pornography or obscene material, gambling, lotteries, illegal drugs, firearms. (Note that vehicle purchases were added and then subsequently deleted from this list.) |
Alcoholic beverage or product, any form of tobacco, pornographic materials, any product or service that is illegal in Utah such as illegal drugs, prostitution and gambling.
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Summary of Provision |
Under the law, "a person shall not send, cause to be sent, or conspire with a third party to send a message to a contact point that has been registered for more than 30 calendar days with the department if the primary purpose of the message is to, directly or indirectly, advertise or otherwise link to a message that advertises a product or service that a minor is prohibited by law from purchasing, viewing, possessing, participating in, or otherwise receiving." |
Under the law, "A person may not send, cause to be sent, or conspire with a third party to send a communication to a contact point or domain that has been registered for more than 30 calendar days ... if the communication ... advertises a product or service that a minor is prohibited by law from purchasing; or ... contains or advertises material that is harmful to minors." |
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Fee |
$7 per thousand names checked |
$5 per thousand names checked |
More information on Michigan law:
https://www.protectmichild.com/compliance.html
More information on Utah law:
https://www.utahkidsregistry.com/compliance.html
To actively assist our customers who may be affected, Silverpop
is working closely with registries in both states, and will be
beta testing the scrubbing mechanisms as soon as they become
available. Although compliance is mandatory, the company
contracted by the states to establish the registries has only just
begun beta testing its scrubbing mechanisms, and neither state has
released its application process for gaining access to the live
registries.
What You Need to Do
Regardless of whether the states are prepared, emailers must adhere to the new laws. Because deadlines for compliance are rapidly approaching, it is vital that we know which of our clients are affected, and will need our assistance in scrubbing their lists. If you anticipate that you will need to scrub your Silverpop email lists against these registries, please send an email to clientsupport@silverpop.com by July 29th and ask to be included in the Child Protection Implementation Group.
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