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FTC announces "click-to-cancel" rule making it easier to cancel subscriptions

(www.ftc.gov)
1737 points pseudolus | 1 comments | 16 Oct 24 13:09 UTC | HN request time: 0.203s | source
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Uehreka ◴[16 Oct 24 15:57 UTC] No.41860626[source]▶
When people try and say that regulating stuff like this is impossible, I often think about how unreasonably great the regulations around “Unsubscribe” links in emails are.

There really seems to be no loophole or workaround despite there being huge incentive for there to be one. Every time I click an “Unsubscribe” link in an email (it seems like they’re forced to say “Unsubscribe” and not use weasel words to hide the link) I’m either immediately unsubscribed from the person who sent me the email, or I’m taken to a page which seemingly MUST have a “remove me from all emails” option.

The level of compliance (and they can’t even do malicious compliance!) with this is absurd. If these new rules work anything like that, they’ll be awesome. Clearly regulating behavior like this is indeed possible.

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1. AnthonyMouse ◴[16 Oct 24 22:07 UTC] No.41864326[source]▶
> When people try and say that regulating stuff like this is impossible, I often think about how unreasonably great the regulations around “Unsubscribe” links in emails are.

The general problem is that the government is miserable at drafting things. Even take the regulation you like:

https://www.ftc.gov/business-guidance/resources/can-spam-act...

> "Your message must include your valid physical postal address."

WTF? They can't just pass a simple rule that says you need a working unsubscribe link, they have to include some arduous nonsense that requires small businesses to pay for a PO box so they don't have to publish their home address in every email.

Nobody wants to unsubscribe by postal mail. But decades later the requirement is still there. So then businesses oppose every new rule because the government can't refrain from making them pointlessly onerous.