Ken Magill, Laura Atkins on Zoominfo

Zoominfo -- a company that has created some sort of business contact database where you (you probably being "spammer") can buy lists of email addresses. Ken Magill talks about them here, quoting deliverability consultant Laura Atkins at length.

Here's my take on this.

Problematic? Yes.

Permission-based? No, don't think so. Zoominfo has claimed that CAN-SPAM compliance is followed, but I don't know what that means. CAN-SPAM has nothing to do with permission, and it's all about permission. CAN-SPAM compliance is 100% irrelevant.

Did all of the people whose data is in that database opt-in to have their data put there? It doesn't matter that the data may be publicly available. Just because I put an address on my website, or because you can reverse engineer it because you know how my company formats email addresses, doesn't mean that you have permission to hold my email address or sell it to others.

Also, do you think they were careful to weed out Canadian addresses? PIPEDA compliance is no laughing matter.

And finally, why would you ever WANT to buy these lists? This data is rife with errors. As Laura and Mickey point out, this company makes a heck of a lot of assumptions about who works where. In my case, I'm apparently a "designer" for "Noiseland Industries." What I actually am is a former record producer, and I happily used Noiseland Industries to handle CD production for me. Meaning, they were a vendor I've used a few times.

Time for the Zoominfo challenge: Go to their website, and look up data about yourself. Look up your friends' names too. Get ready to laugh at all the data points they've gotten wrong.

Business contact databases make poor email list sources. It's that simple.

Spam from Postini Servers

John Levine reports on yet another example of spam received from the servers of spam filtering service provider Postini.

Gmail Tempfailing

Word on the street is, if you're running an MTA that utilizes pipelining aggressively, you're probably having trouble sending email to Gmail right now.

Here's an example of the error message received when messages are being deferred: (host aspmx.l.google.com[72.14.205.27] said: 451 4.5.0 SMTP protocol violation, see RFC 2821 (in reply to end of DATA command))

The issue is clearly affecting people running Postfix. I'm unclear on whether or not it is affecting others.

More on the issue, including a fix for Postfix users, can be found over on the Word to the Wise blog.

Backscatter Goes Mainstream

Quick Link: Looks like Backscatter, the annoyance of bounces you receive in response to something somebody else sent (usually spam), has finally made its way into the public eye. USA Today Reports: 'Backscatter spam' gums up many e-mail inboxes.

Tell me about this new opt-out list!

Over here, email marketer Dylan Boyd talks about the the DMA's "launch" of an email opt-out site.

What, you mean, eMPS? That thing that has been around since at least 2005? Actually, since 2000. This is just the same old thing in a shiny new wrapper.

Not only is this thing not brand new, it's not worth the pixels it's printed on.

Think about it. If you only send email to people who explicitly ask for it, then why do you need to work with an opt-out registry? Track who have opted-in to your own list, track (and remove) those who choose to unsubscribe, and that's pretty much all you need to do.

Also, you need to ask yourself, what does compliance with this opt-out registry get you? It's not mandated by law, nor could it have any observable impact on your ability to send email.

What does Spamhaus say about eMPS? "[We know] of no U.S. firm using the DMA's eMPS service that isn't automaticallly by definition a firm sending spam, since the sole reason for users to need to opt-out of bulk email advertising they did not opt-in to is because the sender is sending without consent, i.e: any DMA member that is using eMPS is using it because he is sending Unsolicited Bulk Email, i.e: Spam."

If you send spam, you're going to get blocked, filtered, and blacklisted, even if you use this kind of list. If you don't send spam, you don't need it, as opt-in permission overrides opt-out suppression.

Explain to me once again, what the merit of this thing is? I'm not getting it.

Tracking Spam From "Nett Solutions"

Do you get a lot of spam like this? I do:

Your current website is very strong although we believe your visibility could be greatly improved. We would love to give you a free site review and guide you in how to get more targeted web traffic to your site. Email us today at (gmail account) and we will give you a free analysis. Be sure to include your URL(s) and where you would like us to reach you with results.

The mail is invariably routed through open proxies or bots, and it's pretty darn near anonymous. The only point of contact is some random Gmail account.

It dawned on me after receiving many of these messages, that they are all written very similarly. That suggests to me that it's one person or group sending most of them (to me, anyway). I wasn't quite sure how to track these guys down, so I decided the direct approach was best.

I emailed one of these Gmail accounts, and told them I was interetested. I wanted to learn more. I asked them to contact me. I left no phone number; the only way to get back to me was my email address.

Shortly after, my work number started receiving calls from an unrecognized number. That particular work phone number just routes straight to my voice mail. It's set up to catch people who try to get ahold of me by working the automated phone directory at work. (Meaning, if you're calling me at this number, you probably don't know me.) The calls are logged, the voice mails come to me in email, and I have a record of who called me from where. In this case, the calls were coming from (949) 330-7464.

I didn't return the calls. I waited and figured that eventually, they'd email me. And, they did.

From: Travis Mailhiot [mailto:tmailhiot@nettsolutions.com]
Sent: Friday, September 12, 2008 10:43 AM
To: me
Subject: Getting back to you - Google & Yahoo!

Hello Al,

You requested a free website analysis to determine how we can improve your positioning on Google & Yahoo!.

We have been trying to get in contact with you to make sure we fulfill your request.

Give me a call here in the office ASAP so we can help you. We are in CA on PST and I can be reached until 7pm EST M-F.

I will continue to call, however you have my info and feel free to give me a call.

I look forward to it. Have a great day.

Respectfully,

Travis Mailhiot
Account Executive
Direct - 949-330-7464
Fax - 949-330-7091
Email - tmailhiot@nettsolutions.com
Website - www.nettsolutions.com

The mail came from smtp1.enfrastructure.com [216.174.117.85]. And now, I know who is behind the spam, and I have full headers from them, a complete email message, tying it back to the pseudononymous spam that I've been receiving.

I don't know if Travis Mailhiot is just one of many people at this company trying to build leads through spam, or if this is the modus operandi of the entire company.

However, I do know who to submit to various blacklists, now.

If you're receiving spam like this, start responding. Ask them for more info. Wait and see who responds. There's a good chance the responsible party will be revealed.

(Also, if you're really looking for help with search engine placement and optimization? Look elsewhere. If these guys use spam and proxy abuse as their lead generation process, I can only guess what kind of worst practices their actual search optimization process likely include. I used to help clients with search engine optimization, and I've talked to multiple companies who have learned the hardway that hiring somebody who utilizes bad tactics can result in your website getting banned from Google or Yahoo's index. Not good.)

10/19/2008 Edit: Here's a bit more on Nett Solutions, information found and shared by a fellow spam fighter. Nett Solutions: SEO company pretends special deal with Google. Ripoff Report: Nett Solutions. SEP/SEO Spam: Nett Solutions discussion on Yahoo Answers.