BeatThatQuote.com and WRM-Media.com - unsolicited commercial email

Note: WRM Media and Rob Billington deny that they are spammers and claim that they operate wholly within the law, and that this post misrepresents the activities of their company, which they claim are well known to the ICO and ASA and operate within the rules. You may want to read their long correspondence with the Information Commissioner's Office here, and if you are still not satisfied then you then you can file a complaint with the ICO and ask for formal enforcement of the regulations.. 19/5/10.

So, this unsolicited commercial email slimed its way into my inbox:

Subject: Newsletter: 10 simple ways to save on car costs | Life cover from £1.08 per week
From: "WRM-Media.com" <wrm@offers.beatthatquote.com>
Date: Thu, November 26, 2009 11:44 am

..followed by a load of links to some affiliate site that is promoting itself as a price comparison site. These links all route via myecos.co.uk which is an email marketer before landing on wrmmedia.beatthatquote.com.

What caught my eye first was the wrm-media.com reference, a quick check of the WHOIS details show that the domain name is hidden by ContactPrivacy.com. Now.. normally you shouldn't visit sites that send unsolicited commercial email (or "spam"), but in this case it is very informative.

In particular, the part that reads gives the game away: Most of WRM Media owned data has been collected from the hugely successful Who-Remembers-Me.com website, founded in May 2003 with global membership topping 6 million registered members.

Now, I blogged about this outfit last year and pointed out that they have been in serious trouble before for disreputable practices. Indeed, there are lots of references if you do a Google search for it. But sadly it seems that Who Remembers Me Ltd (who run the operation) are still doing the same thing.

The next step in this chain in myecos.co.uk which is owned by Database Group Interactive. To be fair, they are a long established and pretty reputable outfit. In this case, the email originated from one of their servers at 77.86.25.51 and firing off the whole email to abuse -at- dbgi.co.uk might be enough to get a positive respsonse. [Update 18/3/10: DBGI terminated their relationship with the sender after complaints, so if you get an unsolicited email from these people then DBGI did not send it]

The endpoint of this email is a site called BeatThatQuote.com which is a price comparison site that makes its money through affiliate commissions, and it can pass some of that commission down to whoever provided the click, in this case Who-Remembers-Me.com. They're not particularly evil, and price comparison sites can be useful. However, when it comes to spam control the whole operation is a great big FAIL as their forum at www.beatthatquote.com/forum shows [note that these complaints are quotes from people making complaints about BeatThatQuote.com spam, not from me].

Yes, it's full of complaints about being spammed, for example:

I received an email from this set of shysters

(with the usual disclaimer - We are sending you this email because you previously registered on our site)

must have been a long time ago - like a fool I used the option.

Since then I have received around 50 Rolex/Viagra/sex pill/ etc, SPAM mails a day - never had this problem with my mail address in over 5 years.

Could be just coincidence but it started within a couple of days of hitting that unsubscribe button which didn't work anyway as BTQ continue to send their SPAM rubbish regularly.

I would never dream of using BTQ - ever.

And..

I started getting BTQ spam emails about 3 months ago. I sent 3 emails to the site trying to get off the list because the links to unsubscribe don't work in my mail client (Squirrel Webmail). All of those requests were ignored.

Eventually I had to forward the mail to a different mail account, and managed to unsubscribe via the link.

Today I've started receiving emails again.

I have never subscribed to receive mail from this organisation. It does not say in the email how my email address was collected. I have never registered at the website and have never opted in for these emails via a third party.

It's bad enough that you send emails that are not solicited; and as you're sending to named email addresses it's also illegal, breaching the UK's spam laws. The fact that you apparently don't honour unsubscribe requests is even more unprofessional.

Even if I were interested in the services that your website provides, I'm afraid I wouldn't use it because of your illegal marketing tactics. If you're not prepared to advertise within the law, IMO that makes you the sort of organisation I would not trust for advice.

followed by

I've sent two more emails asking to be taken off your mailing list, and still no response to either of them. My unsubscibe request has still not been processed - I got another spam email today. What a dismal way to run an online business! I'll be forwarding any future emails to Spamcop, so hopefully you'll be blacklisted soon.

And then there is:

Where the victim first posts:

I've noted that in the space of 6 days beatthatquote.com have sent me 6 spam emails to an email address of mine that hasn't been in use for nearly 7 years!

How about you stop sending such useless spam to people who don't want it! I have a feeling that you are breaking the law in the UK, what a disgusting company. I'd certainly never use you for anything you utter idiots.

The BeatThatQuote.com admin replies:

Apologies for the inconvenience our emails have caused. We do have an unsubscribe function you can use but if you prefer I can unsubscribe you manually, you just need to tell me what the email address is and I’ll be happy to do that for you.

But because spammers treat "remove" as "validate" then the inevitable happens a few days later:

So, I unsubscribed the same day I first post on your forum.... guess what! you sent me spam again! Your unsubscribe options don't work! What an awful company!

And also:

It seems that over the last few days you've decided to start sending me Spam Emails (Unsolicited Commercial Email). As I have never visited your website, opted in or given you permission to send me this email I'd like to know your official comment on this before making my formal complaints to the relevant authorities.

I certainly wont be thinking about using your company or website when I do want to purchase services in your market.

At least we can give BeatThatQuote.com some kudos for allowing people to complain about them on their own forum.. or something. [Note, as of May 2010 the forum has been down for "maintenance" for several months. I wonder why?]

So who is to blame? Well, BeatThatQuote.com have been condemned on their own forum and seem to be heading for a corporate Darwin Award. Presumably though they somehow used a list from Who Remembers Me Ltd (now known as WRM Media Ltd). Was it lists from the WRM email list that generated the spam complaints? It's hard to be certain.. perhaps it is just a coincidence.

My advice.. try one of the following:

• Unsubscribe. Who knows.. it might work, but if you keep getting spam then it makes your case much stronger.
• For amusement only, you could always complain in the BeatThatQuote.com forum. [Currently unavailable as of March 2010]
  
• Fire off an abuse complaint to abuse -at- dbgi.co.uk [No need for this, DBGI terminated their relationship]
  
• The ASA have dealt with spam from these people before, so file a complaint.
• If you have opted out of this spam and you still get it, file a complaint with the ICO.
• And finally, never ever do business with spammers in any case (the "Boulder Pledge")