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Comment by helloguillecl | Hacker News Reader

Question: How do I prove to the authorities that a subscriber has given consent?

I imagine that an attribute on my "users" table is not enough?

In any reasonable law, you would prove that your procedures require consent before you start sending the emails. If you have to prove things about a specific user, you are already on unreasonable land.

(But then, I have no idea what places have reasonable rules. I have never seen any with this specific failure for email, but IANAL and I haven't looked much.)

Actually this sounds like common law to me. But yes, this should be enough to me.

However, if I consent to a User Agreement, do you really think they keep a copy of the specific version of the User Agreement I accepted?

They almost certainly keep a copy of that specific version of the UA. They also very likely keep a log of you agreeing to it. And probably none of those would matter in a court (what you actually say on your site and how reasonable the document is certainly matter a lot more).

Anyway, UA acceptance does not require and does not imply in opt-in to your marketing emails.

“Double Opt In” is the way to go.

They sign up, then you send them an email and track when they hit the “I approve” link.

Watch out, if you get a HTTP GET request on the approve link, it could be the mail provider scanning for malware, not the user. You may need triple opt in :-)

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