Buying Lists

One of my email addresses at a client got spammed today offering to sell me appending services. I was going to post the email here and point out all of the problems in how he was advertising it, including violating CAN SPAM.
As I often do, I plugged his phone number into google, only to discover that my blog post from March about this spammer was the 2nd hit for that number. Well, go me.
I can report nothing has changed. He’s still violating CAN SPAM. He’s still claiming I have no right to post, share, spindle, mutilate or fold his spam. Well, in the interest in something, I thought I’d share the whole post this time. Just to warn folks from attempting to purchase services from appendleads.com (nice website, by the way).

From: David Williams <davidw@appendleads.com>
Subject: Targeted Email Lists
Date: July 8, 2010 11:17:36 AM PDT
To: Me@client.example.com
Hi Laura,
Would you like to reach your specific target audience in a cost effective, hassle free way? Have you grown tired of dialing the phone only to get another voicemail, an aggressive gatekeeper or “can you call back in 10 minutes” only to find they’re gone for the day? We make it easy to reach your specific target audience, whether you need to reach sales and marketing executives, CEO’s, director’s of HR or anyone in between.
Also, we offer email append services. If you use an in-house database but it does not include emails or the emails are out of date, we will append the emails in less than 1 weeks time. Out of site is out of mind, never let your client’s lose sight of you. To know how it works we offer email append test at no cost, so send us 50 to 100 contacts with just contact & company names in a spread sheet and we will provide the emails within 24 hours.
Reach out to hundreds of thousands of contacts with our ready to use email list or we can custom build a list based on your specific requirements. Our lists include contact name, title and email address, plus company name, postal address, phone, fax, SIC code, NAICS, employees, revenue and more. Let me know your specific target audience and a few free samples will be sent for your review.
Our objective is to help you to reach your target audience more effectively and economically. Let me know if you or someone else in your organization is responsible for such a decision.Your time and effort in referring me to someone will be appreciated.
Warm Regards,
David Williams
Lead Generation Specialist
Phone: +1 800-961-5127
NOTE: If you feel you have received this message by accident, or if you want to be deleted from further communications from me, please reply in the subject remove or opt-out.
This communication (including any attachments) may contain legally privileged and confidential information and is intended for a specific individual and purpose. If you are not the intended recipient, disclosing, copying, distributing, or taking any action based on this message is strictly prohibited.

Creating effective links
Appendleads is not unusual

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TWSD: Run, hide and obfuscate

Spammers and spamming companies have elevated obfuscating their corporate identities to an artform. Some of the more dedicated, but just this side of legal, spammers set up 3 or 4 different front companies: one to sell advertising, one or more to actually send mail, one to get connectivity and one as a backup for when the first three fail. Because they use rotating domain names and IP addresses all hidden behind fake names or “privacy protection services”, the actual spammer can be impossible to track without court documents.
One example of this is Ken Magill’s ongoing series of reports about EmailAppenders.
Aug 5, 2008 Ouch: A List-Purchase Nighmare
Sept 9, 2008 Umm… About EmailAppenders’ NYC Office
Sept 15, 2008 E-mail Appending Plot Thickens
Nov 11, 2008 EmailAppenders Hawking Bogus List, Claims Publisher
Dec 23, 2008 Internet Retailer Sues EmailAppenders
Feb 1, 2009 EmailAppenders Update
Mar 10, 2009 Another Bogus E-mail List Claimed
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April 21, 2009 EmailAppenders Gone? New Firm Surfaces
May 5, 2009 EmailAppenders Back with New Web Site, New Name
Their actions, chronicled in his posts, are exactly what I see list providers, list brokers and “affiliate marketers” do every day. They hide, they lie, they cheat and they obfuscate. When someone finally decides to sue, they dissolve one company and start another. Every new article demonstrates what spammers do in order to stay one step ahead of their victims.
While Ken has chronicled one example of this, there are dozens of similar scammers. Many of them don’t have a persistent reporter documenting all the company changes, so normal due diligence searches fail to turn up any of the truth. Companies looking for affiliates or list sources often fall victim to scammers and spammers, and suffer delivery and reputation problems as a result.
Companies that insist on using list sellers, lead generation companies and affilates must protect themselves from these sorts of scammers. Due diligence can be a challenge, because of the many names, domains and businesses these companies hide behind. Those tasked with investigating affiliates, address sources or or mailing partners can use some of the same investigative techniques Ken did to identify potential problems.

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20M “opt-in” leads a month is roughly 650,000 leads a day.

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Are you still thinking of purchasing a mailing list?

Last week there was an article published by btobonline promoting the services of a company called Netprospex. Netprospex, as you can probably gather from their company name, is all about the buying and selling of mailing lists. They will sell anyone a list of prospects.
The overall theme of the article is that there is nothing wrong with spam and that if a sender follows a few simple rules spamming will drive business to new heights. Understandably, there are a few people who disagree with the article and the value of the Netprospex lists.
I’ve stayed out of the discussion, mostly because it’s pretty clear to me that article was published solely to promote the Netprospex business, and their point of view is that they make more money when they can convince people to purchase lists from them. Dog bites man isn’t a very compelling news story. Data selling company wants you to buy data from them isn’t either.
They are right, there is nothing illegal about spam. Any sender can purchase a list and then send mail to the addresses on that list and as long as that sender meets the rock bottom standards set out in CAN SPAM. As long as your mail has an opt-out link, a physical postal address and unforged headers that mail is legal. The only other obligation on the sender is to honor any unsubscribe requests within ten days. So, yes, it is legal to send spam.
But legal action isn’t the only consequence of spamming. Today I received the following in an email from a colleague.

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