Opt-in — Single-step consent grant
What is Opt-in?
An opt-in is a recipient's affirmative grant of permission to be contacted — the single-step consent event that a signup form, a keyword reply, or a checkout checkbox produces. Every valid opt-in records a constellation of facts a dispute defense needs: the scope it covers (which channel, or `all`), the timestamp it was captured, and the source that collected it (a form, a keyword, the Consent API). It is the baseline evidence-of-consent the country rules grade before any send leaves the platform.
More detail
A single opt-in resolves a (contact, channel) pair to a consent ledger entry, keeping the scope narrow by default: an SMS signup does not silently extend to voice or WhatsApp unless the capture surface declared the wider scope. The timestamp matters because a hand-me-down list held for months is weaker evidence than a consent captured hours before the first send; the source matters because a keyword reply and a web form carry different proof weights in a carrier audit or a dispute defense.
Region grades the floor. France and the EU treat prior opt-in as the legal floor for marketing traffic — an undocumented send is the sender's compliance failure, and the recipient's opt-in must exist before dispatch. The US CAN-SPAM baseline tolerates single opt-in as a common minimum for email, though carrier 10DLC vetting and CTIA guidelines still grade the quality of the disclosure and artifact — some carriers effectively expect the recorded confirmation double opt-in adds on top.
On Orbit the grant lands as a consent ledger entry the send-time gate reads: sends to a contact with a recorded opt-in proceed; sends against a refused or unknown posture stop at the gate the consent-default posture policy controls. The term is not the legal conclusion — the platform records the (scope, timestamp, source) constellation and enforces the policy the tenant declares; deciding which jurisdictions accept single opt-in alone remains the sender's call.
Frequently asked
- What is the difference between single and double opt-in?
- Single opt-in records one affirmative grant — a form submission or a keyword reply. Double opt-in adds a second recorded step, a confirmation reply that promotes the consent from pending to confirmed. Single opt-in is the faster baseline; double opt-in is the stronger evidence standard carriers and dispute counsel grade against.
- Which channels does an opt-in cover?
- Whatever the capture surface declared. A consent entry carries a scope — `sms`, `whatsapp`, `voice`, `email`, or `all` — and the gate enforces that scope per send. A granular capture that starts at one channel stays on that channel until the recipient widens it.
- Is single opt-in enough for France?
- For marketing SMS, yes on paper — the FR rule is prior opt-in, not double opt-in. Orbit's country-requirements matrix marks France as GDPR-grade prior-opt-in: single, documented, before the first dispatch. The sms-scope consent entry plus the no-send window is the posture the gate enforces; the sender still carries the legal posture.
See also
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