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February 2, 2006
Illegal spam from Microsoft
One of Microsoft's IP addresses has landed on the SpamCop blacklist.
It happened today, after junk email touting the MSN Dial-up service apparently leaked out of Microsoft Corporation network space, landing in at least one account belonging to a SpamCop user.
Amazingly, the spam fails to comply with CAN-SPAM, in that it lacks a physical mailing address, not to mention an unsubscribe link. There's no obvious unsubscribe link at the target web site either.
A web bug in the MSN spam (anchored to here) suggests that the spam run (and dirty mailing list) may be the work of Atlas, a unit of Seattle-based online marketeer aQuantive, Inc.
Still, as Microsoft nemesis Robert Soloway painfully learned, advertisers can't legally hide behind "button pushers" like Atlas.
If Microsoft had done its homework, it would have found that Atlas apparently has quite a track record of sending non-compliant spam to spam traps and other accounts operated by anti-spammers.
Soloway went on a tirade last summer, broadcasting emails that descried Microsoft's spamming practices and announcing the formation of a group called Strategic Partnership Against Microsoft Illegal Spam.
This embarassing little MSN spam run follows in the wake of some rather silly media scrutiny of Bill Gates' prediction about the impending death of spam.
Posted by brian at February 2, 2006 7:49 PM
Comments
What beautiful irony.
Posted by: John at March 28, 2006 3:53 AM
