Have spammers given up their nefarious, misleading practices and dedicated themselves to good? A recent message said:
From: "Alta Berger" < @ .com> To: < @ .com.hk> Subject: Re: your web site is interesting... Date sent: Mon, 28 Nov 2005 23:40:28 +0600 Send reply to: "Alta Berger" @ .com this is your non-profit/charity contact email address right? If so... we will email your web site to 2,500,000 opt-in emails for free
It says the addresses are opt-in, so that is OK and legitimate, right? The message continues on about the worthy charities they have contributed to in the last year. Finally! An ethical, generous spammer!
But wait, if they are using an opt-in list, why did I receive it? Why did they think my address was a charity contact address? What is their real agenda? At the end, the message says,
if this is not a non-profit/charity contact email address and/or you are not interested in our occassional non-commercial, non-transactional, non-cost, non-relationship, courtesy emailings we perform for various nonprofits and charities, delist at: http:// . . .com
This looks like the standard “tell us your address is working” ploy. The offer to charities could be genuine… with a hidden catch. Spammers are facing increasing pressure from proposed legislation, but maybe they can blunt the laws by claiming spam has beneficial value to society. Or maybe there plan is to encourage legitimate charities to spam so that the spammers fraudulent “charity appeals” appear more plausible.
Wise charities should avoid spamming: they will annoy millions of potential donors who might have responded favourably to a different approach.