Ford: Emailing a Five-Year Dead Email Address
Ford Motor Company is sending bulk email to an email address that last had a real person using it in 2006. It was in timeout from late 2007 through early 2009, and then re-enabled as a spamtrap. Ford may be emailing a list that has not been emailed for years, may have ignored bounces in 2007-2009, or might have purchased a list. The ESP is Responsys.
Sending IP: 12.130.136.170
Spam Sample:
Actual Headers:
Received: from om-wunderman.rsys1.com (om-wunderman.rsys1.com [12.130.136.170])
by <xxx> (Postfix) with ESMTP id <xxx>
for <xxx>; Tue, 8 Nov 2011 12:xx:xx -0600 (CST)
DKIM-Signature: <xxx>
DomainKey-Signature: <xxx>
Received: by om-wunderman.rsys1.com (PowerMTA(TM) v3.5r17) id <xxx>
for <xxx>; Tue, 8 Nov 2011 10:xx:xx -0800
(envelope-from <xxx>)
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary="----msg_border_JAEg2WCOMH"
Date: Tue, 8 Nov 2011 10:xx:xx -0800
From: "Ford" <ford@email.fordvehicles.com>
Reply-To: "Ford" <myford@customersupportctr.com>
Subject: Get a closer look at the 2012 Focus Electric, then reserve yours today
List-Unsubscribe: https://wunderman.rsys2.net/pub/optout?<xxx>
X-<xxx>: <xxx>
X-<xxx>: <xxx>
X-<xxx>: <xxx>
To: <xxx>
Message-ID: <<xxx>@om-wunderman.rsys1.com>
Readable Email:
From: Ford <ford@email.fordvehicles.com>
To: <spamtrap>
Subject: Get a closer look at the 2012 Focus Electric, then reserve yours today
Reply-To: Ford <myford@customersupportctr.com>
Please add ford@email.fordvehicles.com to your safe list to continue receiving new product information and
updates from Ford.
https://wunderman.rsys2.net/pub/cc?<xxx>
<removed>
The 2012 Focus Electric is gas-free, 100% electric and open for reservations.
https://wunderman=2Ersys2=2Enet/pub/cc?<xxx>
<removed>
Ford Division Marketing Center
Attn: Email Opt-Out
7777 N. Wickham Rd. =2312 – 424
Melbourne, FL 32940
All Rights Reserved.
Six months later, Ford is *still* emailing a now-six year dead email address. <wry grin> I haven’t heard a peep from Responsys. They might want to look at yesterday’s blog about Broderbund’s ongoing spam hits on a single spamtrap. Ford is not mailing as frequently; otherwise this is a similar situation.
After a break of several weeks, Ford is again emailing the same six-year-dead email address. :/
Any more emails from Ford? I know I still occassionally get emails from them even though I unsubscribed several months ago!
I haven’t seen any more since they quit coming sometime this summer. That doesn’t mean much where your issue is concerned, though. Many ESPs and companies are removing “inactives” from their lists to avoid reputation damage or blocklisting. Unfortunately, if you’ve been reading their email in any sort of email program that retrieves and renders images, you “confirmed” that you are reading their email. That means that they would consider you an “active” subscriber and not remove your email address.
*Any* marginally decent company would remove your email address in response to an explicit opt-out. Apparently Ford’s opt-out process is screwed up. 🙁 What you might want to do is to get on Twitter and send a Tweet @Ford and @ScottMontey (Ford’s “social media head”) and ask why your repeated opt-out requests have been ignored. If they don’t tweet back, send another tweet and ask again. 😉
Thanks for the suggestion!