Academic Insight, a U.S.-based academic test preparation service, is sending bulk email advertisements to an email address that was closed in 2003. This spamtrap has also not previously received email from this company. The ESP is Vertical Response.
SalsaLabs, the ESP side of liberal U.S. political activist group Wired for Change, is sending bulk email to yet more email addresses that were closed years ago, inviting the owners to a Webinar on the tools and techniques for advocacy organizations. Since SalsaLabs is an ESP as well as an organization that provides tools and training to mostly-liberal and leftist advocacy groups, this email was sent by them from their own IPs.
The United States branch of Swedish home furnishings company IKEA is sending spam to a role email address, an email address that never sent mail or signed onto bulk email lists, advertising furniture and home products. The advertising email states that the spammed email address “recently registered with a network website to receive special online offers”. This is not true. Other language in the spam invites the spam victim to sign up for their list, which appears to acknowledge that IKEA knows that the owner of this email address did not in fact ask for email from IKEA. In short, IKEA appears to have purchased a list and to make no effort to hide that fact. The ESP is Yesmail, a division of InfoGroup.
Martha White, a US-based seller of baking products, is sending bulk email to an email address that has never existed (also called a pure spamtrap) advertising Smuckers products. (Smuckers is a household name in the US, mostly known for its jams and preserves.) Martha White might possibly have failed to confirm a typoed web subscription, but the email address in question is not one that would easily be typoed, so a purchased list seems likely. The sending ESP is Silverpop.
Lenox, the highly-regarded American maker of fine china, is sending email to an email address that — if it ever existed — was closed before 2008. The email indicates that this email address “recently registered with a network website to receive special online offers”. As with Fuddruckers and a significant amount of other spam sent by ESP Yesmail, this is not true for any reasonable definition of “recently”. Either Lenox is allowing users to subscribe via a web form and is not confirming subscriptions, or Lenox purchased a list.
Fuddruckers, a high-end hamburger restaurant in the United States, is sending bulk email to an email address that has not belonged to a real person since 2007, offering the owner of that email address the chance to win a $500 gift card for “liking” Fuddruckers on Facebook. The email indicates that this email address “recently registered with a network website to receive special online offers”. This is not true for any reasonable definition of “recently”. Either Fuddruckers is allowing users to subscribe via a web form and is not confirming subscriptions, or Fuddruckers purchased a list. The ESP is Yesmail, a division of InfoGroup.
S.C. Johnson, a U.S.-based household products company known to every small child (and everybody else) in the United States, is sending bulk emails to email addresses that have not been live for many years. These email addresses receive no legitimate email. Until today, they have received no email from S.C. Johnson. So why are these email addresses suddenly getting email from this company? One spamtrap hit might be a typo; several usually means a purchased list. The ESP is Cheetahmail, a subsidiary of Experian.
IWA Publishing, the publications wing of the International Water Association, is sending bulk email to an old role address that was closed in 2007. The ESP is MailChimp.
That settles it. There is no intelligent life left at Topps. A month after their first mention on the MainSleaze blog and weeks after an SBL listing for their spam, they are *still* spamming. Topps is spamming from its own IPs. If they’d been using an ESP, after the SBL listing the mailings would have stopped at least until they could clean their list and convince Spamhaus to give them another chance.
Solmicro, a vendor of ERP (enterprise resource planning) management solutions, is sending bulk email to an email address that has never existed except in the fertile mind of a spammer who made it up and put it on a list for sale. Either Solmicro is accepting unconfirmed web form subscriptions (along with the attendant typos and third-party signups), or Solmicro purchased a list. The ESP is Cheetahmail, a division of Experian.