Why is legal compliance important?

GetResponse adds your business address to the default email footer (see below) to comply with legal regulations of the CAN-SPAM Act.

To avoid being classified as spam by major Internet service providers (ISP), your newsletter needs to meet a number of legal requirements. To help you meet them, we as your email service provider (ESP) have defined some default specifications that your account and campaigns need to comply with.

If your newsletter is considered spam, it immediately affects your deliverability and brand reputation, and it’s quite hard to win them back.

By enforcing the most important legal requirements, we establish and maintain good relationships with all major ISPs. In consequence, this increases customer email deliverability, builds subscriber trust and improves brand image.

Our legal requirements correspond with the legal requirements that are binding all over the world. However, some countries have their own additional legal policies that you need to know when addressing recipients in a particular region.

Requirements for all GetResponse accounts

• In order to send emails from GetResponse, you must agree to our terms of service.
• To complete your account activation, you must provide your full postal address in account settings.
• This address is used in the default footer, which is required to be included in every newsletter sent from your account.
• This default footer also includes a required unsubscribe link.
• GetResponse verifies the email address that you use in the “reply to” field.
• Be aware that it is illegal to falsify your contact information or information in your subject line.
• Your newsletters need to comply with the U.S. CAN-SPAM Act. Failure to meet its requirements may result in legal liability to each recipient that received a message that didn’t comply with the policy. So our recommendation is that you know the Act and always make sure that your message doesn’t breach any of its points.
• We are a U.S. based company, so we need to make sure that all U.S. standards are met. However, some additional regulations can be binding in your subscribers’ country of residence, and it is your responsibility to know and respect them.

Foreign anti-spam laws and regulations

Here is a list of selected legal acts to help you access and acquaint yourself with the most important anti-spam regulations in countries you might be sending to.

Australia
Spam Act 2003, Act No. 129 of 2003 as amended

Canada- C-28
Canada’s Anti-Spam Legislation (CASL) which amends the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission Act, the Competition Act, the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act and the Telecommunications Act.

European Union
The Contact Network of Spam Enforcement Authorities (CNSA)

European Union legislation regarding processing and storing personal data and protection of privacy in electronic communications sector:

Article 13 of DIRECTIVE 2002/58/EC OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL of 12 July 2002

The Directive is implemented by each member state independently, so you should check laws of your particular country for more details.

United Kingdom (UK)
The Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations

Austria
Telecommunications Act 2003

Belgium
Etat des lieux en juillet 2003, July 4, 2003

Cyprus
Section 06 of the Regulation of Electronic Communications and Postal Services Law of 2004 (Law 12 (I) / 2004 deals with unsolicited communications (spam)

Czech Republic
Act No. 480/2004 Coll., on Certain Information Society Services

Estonia
Information Society Service Act

France
CNIL Guidelines on email marketing.

Germany
Art. 7 German Unfair Competition Law (Gesetz gegen Unlauteren Wettbewerb) (UWG) Art. 202a, 263, 303a, 303b of the German Criminal Code
Art. 6 of the German Law regarding Information Society Services
Art. 28 Par. 4 of the German Data Protection Act

Italy
Please be aware that Italian anti-spam regulations are very strict. Failure to obey them may even result in imprisonment.

Personal Data Protection Code (legislative decree no. 196/2003)

The Code transposed EC Directive 95/46 on the protection of personal data and EC Directive 2002/58 on privacy in electronic communications; it consolidated all Italian pre-existing laws and regulations in this sector.

DL 196/2003 Personal Data Protection Code • DL 675/1996 on privacy protection states, inter alia, that a company must have authorization from each user whose personal data (such as e-mail) they want to use. • DL 171/1998 (deriving from the European Community directive 97/66/CE)

DL 185/1999 (deriving from the European Community directive 97/7/CE) on customer protection with respect to long-distance contracts: this obliges companies to seek the permission of the user for virtual or telephone sales.

Netherlands
Article 11.7 of the Dutch Telecommunications Act and Dutch Data Protection Act

Sweden
Swedish Marketing Act (Swedish Code of Statutes, SFS 1995:450) Personal Data Act (Swedish Code of Statutes, SFS 1998:204)