The Direct Marketing Association chimed in on a day of anti-spam news by announcing that "commercial messages should not be sent when e-mail addresses have been captured surreptitiously" -- a practice
often called harvesting. In addition, The DMA announced its position against the practice of "automatic algorithmic e-mail addressing, also known as dictionary attacks, "that spammers use in mass
untargeted marketing campaigns or in order to ascertain live addresses. According to The DMA, both practices constitute abuses of the right to send e-mail legitimately and could ultimately undercut
e-mail as a valuable business communications tool.