The Spanish government plans to submit an Internet regulation bill to parliament which would ban unsolicited e-mail advertising and enable the authorities to shut down web sites.
Under the bill, which was adopted yesterday by the cabinet, authorities would be allowed to temporarily shut down a web site if it were found in breach of the peace or public health or violated an individual's dignity.
Only a judge would be entitled to order the permanent closure of a site.
The bill also lays down a code of conduct and transparency norms for companies who do business over the Internet, and bans "spam" or unsolicited advertising.
Sending "spam" would be punishable by a fine of between 60,001 to 300,000 euro.
The European Union has so far held back from banning so-called "opt out" e-mail - messages which Internet users have not specifically agreed in advance to receive. The Commission has preferred to leave the onus on users to "opt out" by asking to be taken off mailing lists after they have received unwanted messages.
The proposed Spanish law also stipulates that the individual creator of a web page is to be considered solely responsible for the content displayed.
The company hosting the page could only be held legally responsible if it was found to have been aware of the illegal content, and had not acted to remove it.
The bill is expected to be adopted by parliament this summer.
AFP
