1. Purpose
This policy describes the permitted and prohibited uses of corporate email systems for bulk emailing. Its purpose is to:
1. protect organizational reputation,
2. preserve the effectiveness of email as a business communication medium,
3. prevent a potential breach of the US CAN-SPAM Act by employees, and
4. to generally encourage adherence to e-mail best practices.
2. Overview
The practice of sending unsolicited, commercial mass e-mails represents a potential threat to organizational reputation and maybe violation, which defines the quantity and characteristics of bulk commercial e-mails that may legally be sent. All communications with customers, prospects, and other professionals reflect XXX. In light of increasing antipathy to unsolicited email promotions of any kind, it is generally in the best interest of XXX to limit electronic mailings to legitimate communications with individuals who have indicated a willingness to receive them.
3. Scope
All individuals who use the e-mail systems and addresses to send bulk e-mails to customers, prospects, or other types of recipients.
3.1 Employees
This policy applies to all Employees, Contractors, and Third Party Employees, who use, process, and manage information and business processes of XXX.
3.2 Documentation
The documentation shall consist of the software installation Policy, and related procedures & guidelines. This Policy document and all other referenced documents shall be controlled. Version control shall be to preserve the latest release and the previous version of any document. However, the previous version of the documents shall be retained only for a period of two years for legal and knowledge preservation purposes.
3.3 Records
Records being generated as part of this Policy shall be retained for a period of two years. Records shall be in hard copy or electronic media. The records shall be owned by the respective system administrators and shall be audited once a year.
3.4 Distribution and Maintenance
This Policy document shall be made available to all the employees covered in the scope. All the changes and new releases of this document shall be made available to the persons concerned. The maintenance responsibility of the document shall be with the CISO and system administrators.
4. Privacy
This Policy document shall be considered as “confidential” and shall be made available to the concerned persons with proper access control. Subsequent changes and versions of this document shall be controlled.
5. Responsibility
This Policy shall be implemented by the CISO and designated personnel (if any). This policy has full support from the executive steering committee and human resources. This policy is a living document and may be modified at any time by the IT manager, human resources, or the executive steering committee.
6 Policy
- All mass emails must be approved by IT Manager.
- Individuals may send mass emails for the purpose of marketing or sales of products, services, or programs only to:
- Recipients who specifically consented to receive marketing or sales emails
- Recipients who have not explicitly opted out of receiving marketing or sales emails
- Mass emails sent from computers or email addresses may not:
- o Contain false or misleading information in the subject line, headers, or email body
- o In any way misrepresent or disguise the sender, point of origin, or the transmission path
- Individuals may not send any emails to addresses that have been illicitly harvested, mined, or skimmed from one or more third-party Web sites. Employees may not build e-mail addresses or lists by guessing or using software to generate character strings that are likely to be associated with live email accounts.
Anti-spam restrictions also apply to other forms of electronic messaging:
- Individuals may not post promotions or advertisements for products, services, or programs in newsgroups, message boards, chat rooms, or other online services in violation of the terms of participation of those online services.
- Individuals may not post promotions or advertisements for products, services, or programs in newsgroups, message boards, chat rooms, or other online services that do not explicitly permit advertisements.
- Individuals may not use vendors, software, or service providers or to circumvent the intent of this policy.
7 Enforcement
Any employee found to have violated this policy may be subjected to disciplinary action in line with the HR Policy. Violation of this policy may result in disciplinary action which may include performance sanctions; termination for employees and temporaries; a termination of employment relations in the case of contractors or consultants; dismissal for interns and volunteers; or suspension or expulsion in the case of a student. Additionally, individuals are subject to restriction or suspension of email privileges, as well as civil and criminal prosecution.
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