Recently, the first incident of wireless spam in the U.S. was reported by users of AT&T Wireless in Phoenix, Arizona. These subscribers reported receiving unsolicited text messages from a mortgage company pitching its services. What has annoyed them is the realization that they are paying for every unwanted message. A spokesperson for AT&T Wireless told The New York Times that it does have filters in place to catch unwanted messages but will increase its filtering capabilities to prevent future problems.

In the United States, an anti-spam bill has been voted on in the House of Representatives while a second bill to block wireless spam has been introduced in Congress.

But even with anti-spam laws, wireless spam will be even more difficult to track than traditional junk mail. This is due to the fact that during transmission, when a message travels off the Internet and is converted to SMS code by the wireless carriers, the header of the e-mail is stripped away. Without knowing where it came from, how can you go after the spammer?