If you thought flashing billboards were annoying, Internet pop-ups were irritating and dinnertime telemarketers were intrusive, then welcome to what could be the next advertising nightmare: cell phone spam.
Spam sent via instant messaging devices, or "spim," is the next generation of junk e-mail, except this time it's targeting the unprotected text message mailboxes of mobile phones - and most of the time, wireless customers are paying to receive it.
Much like their Internet counterparts, spim messages advertise everything from product promotions to pornography and are sent out at arbitrary, oftentimes inappropriate hours of the day.
Approximately 4 billion spim messages were received by mobile phone users in the United States in 2004, according to The Direct Marketing Association. As 2005 progresses, this number is expected to increase rapidly.
Despite these alarming figures, spim is a relatively new issue within the U.S. wireless industry, but is already rampant throughout East Asian countries such as Japan, China and Taiwan. As early as 2003, leading Japanese phone company NTT DoCoMo reported the suspension of 3,009 identified spammers' access to DoCoMo customer lines in retaliation against cellular spam, according to a press release on the company's Web site, www.docomo.com.
Rochelle Cohen, senior director of media relations for Cingular Wireless, was reluctant to comment on the legality of domestic cell phone spam. In order to evaluate the lawfulness of such wireless advertisements, she said a detailed definition of what spam is and precisely where it is sent from must be established per case.
However, the revised 1991 Telephone Consumer Protection Act, implemented in June 2003, states telemarketers may not call a phone number assigned to a cell or paging service where the receiver is charged for the call. It also prohibits any phone solicitations with individuals listed on the Federal Communications Commission's "national do-not-call registry."
According to this regulation, marketers also may not use randomly or sequentially generated numbers in sales or marketing solicitations, thereby curbing any further access to cellular phone customers by wireless spammers.
Although many cell phone users haven't encountered cell phone spam, the thought of it irritates a majority of the wireless community.
"It falls into the same line as telemarketing and e-mail spam and is a gross invasion of privacy - especially if you're being charged for (the text message)," international business junior Gavin Richardson said.
Political science sophomore Justin McCarthy said a cell phone is a personal device that shouldn't be used as a corporate tool.
"It's worse for people like me who have to pay 5 cents every time I receive a text message," he said. "I'm paying for something I don't really want."
Signing up for promotion newsletters or sweepstakes, however, can authorize and initiate cell phone spam.
Reflecting on his experience of receiving cell phone spam through his provider, Cingular Wireless, psychology senior Dave Kozin said, "It's better than phone calls, but it's still a form of spam, unless you signed up for a newsletter or something."
Unlike more conventional forms of advertisements such as billboards, which target a demographic region, Kozin said wireless spam reaches subscribers who are in fact "just a number" and recipients of what he called a largely "ineffective form of marketing."
While many are directly offended by spim, some consumers believe spammers will fall to their own follies.
"Personally, I wouldn't be too bothered by (cell phone spam), but I would never acknowledge the company that sent it, and would most likely lose respect for their business because of the way they are marketing and advertising their products and services," pre-marketing freshman Ashley Paluck said.
To help curb wireless spam, cell phone customers can enroll in the FCC's "national do-not-call registry" at www.fcc.gov/cgb/denotcall.
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