AOL’s certified e-mail plan sparks furor

AOL’s plan to implement a fee-based “certified” e-mail service within the next 30 days is setting off a firestorm of protest. A coalition of more than 50 organizations has formed to fight AOL’s opt-in plan to institute a quarter-cent charge per e-mail for delivery of authenticated messages.

One participant of the coalition, Danny O’Brien, activist coordinator of Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), characterized AOL’s plan as a “slippery slope that will dismantle Net freedoms,” and he also called the AOL plans an “e-mail tax” and an “assault on the Internet.” Moreover, the group said that it fears the fee-based plan will divide the Internet into two classes of users — those who get preferential treatment and those who don’t.

On Friday, AOL announced it would not charge legitimate not-for-profit organizations and advocacy groups to have their e-mails authenticated and delivered to allay fears.

Richard Gingras, CEO and co-founder of Goodmail Systems, the technology and service provider that AOL will use for the certified e-mail service, said the charges were “absurd, misguided,” and filled with “emotional rhetoric.”

In fact, AOL is not the only provider prepping such a service. Gingras said Yahoo plans to implement a similar fee-based e-mail service, also based on Goodmail’s CertifiedEmail.

As the trusted intermediary, Goodmail will certify the authenticity of the message sender. Then the Goodmail system inserts inside each message a cryptographic token, which the ISP’s e-mail server deciphers using Goodmail technology. Only then is it sent on to the recipient’s inbox.

The service appears to have benefits for both sending organizations and its members, who can opt in to receiving an organization’s certified e-mail.

For any large organization, the service will assure delivery of critical messages. The system bypasses spam blockers and goes directly from the sender to the ISP inbox, assuring that a spam blocker will not inadvertently block an important e-mail.

“Financial institutions want SLA-level assuredness that messages are getting through,” Gingras said.

On the other side of the inbox, the recipient is assured that the message, such as a request for personal information, is from a legitimate organization and is not a phishing attack.

This plan will also raise the level of trust and encourage the use of online banking and other customer services that have lower support costs for the enterprise, according to Josh Greenbaum, principal at Enterprise Applications Consulting.

Nevertheless, problems remain, Greenbaum said.

“Now we’ve defined the next target for the hackers,” Greenbaum remarked. “If you want to get your spam through, you have to target Goodmail.”

EFF’s O’Brien also counters the notion that the plan will decrease spam, saying that AOL’s spam technology is already quite good and that this kind of service isn’t needed.

Craigslist founder Craig Newmark, also part of the coalition fighting AOL, said such a service will draw resources away from everyday abuse handling.

The heart of O’Brien’s and Newmark’s concerns appears to be the fear that no matter how legitimate AOL’s and Yahoo’s intentions are, the idea of charging for e-mail may open the door for other schemes and other strategies not quite as legitimate.