België/Belgique (BE)

Belgium

2002-01-15: Belgium appears ready to adopt an 'opt-in' system for advertising email.

Concerning certain legal aspects of Information Society services (Bill)

§1. The use of electronic mail for advertising without the prior specific and informed consent of the recipient. The King, together with representatives of the Ministries of Justice and Economic Affairs will determine the forms according to which the consent envisaged in the first part is to be obtained and retained in registries.

§2. When advertising by email, the service provider [sender] is to ensure the following:

1. supplying clear and comprehensible information concerning the right to refuse such advertising in the future.
    
2. to indicate an appropriate method to exercise this right efficiently by electronic means
    

§3. when advertising by electronic mail, it is forbidden

1. to use the electronic address or identity of a third party
    
2. to falsify or disguise information which makes it possible to identify the origin of the message or its routing.
    

§4. The service provider [sender] must prove that advertising by electronic mail was solicited.
 

2001-10-10: The Communications Science Department of the Catholic University of Leuven has published a series of "Privacy Papers", the second of which relates in part to the issue of Unsolicited Commecercial Email. Some of the findings:-

• Response to Email Advertisements
  %	never	seldom	regularly	often
  Unsolicited	88	7	1	1
  Solicited	57	34,5	5,5	1

  
  

• Preferred System (%)
  Opt-In	Opt-Out	Other
  57	29	13

  
   
• "A business can send email to me as long as I have the possibility to stop it whenever I want."
  

  (%) agree	neutral	disagree	no opinion
  47	20,5	28	4,5

  
  
• "A business can send advertising emails to me if I am asked first."
  

  (%) agree	neutral	disagree	no opinion
  73	16	7	4

  
   
• 85% of respondents have at one time or another refused to give personal details on-line, citing lack of confidence and lack of information concerning the purpose for collecting the data.
   
• 60% of respondents have entered an address other than the one they ordinarily use into Web forms.
   

"Minimum" provisions of the Distance Contracts and Data Protection and Telecommunications directives will be implemented by amendments to the "distance selling" section of the Law of 14 July 1991 concerning commercial practice and concerning information and consumer protection. This will probably take the form of a "right of refusal" [i.e. "opt-out"] which should be able to be exercised by consumers at no cost to themselves. The actual methods will be the subject of regulations.

Thanks to the Commercial Regulations section of the Commercial Policy Administration of the Ministry of Economic Affairs

(Beebit 1998-07-08)