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 Related quotes 
Related storiesConsumer Reviews: CBS MarketWatch Consumer Reviews: Fast Search and Transfer Consumer Reviews: Chemists Art Gallery Also featured today Around Asia: May 29, 2001 More Faces In
The News: May 29, 2001 News Scan P.M.: May
29, 2001 U.S. tech
stocks fall on Sun, EMC outlook, Dow ekes out gain Intel Braces Itself
For High-End Server Space Four Phenomenal
Women Body Count Update:
May 29, 2001 House For Sale
By Citigroup? Faces In The
News: May 29, 2001 News Scan: May 29,
2001 
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Caveat Subscriber Register at a Web site or buy something online and you get more than you bargained for: a different kind of spam.Nine months ago Bernardo de Albergaria, an Internet marketer from Santa Barbara, Calif., ordered vitamins online and was required to leave his e-mail address to register. He also agreed to receive product updates but decided he wanted out a few weeks later—and soon found it might be easier to get out of the mob.De Albergaria went online to end the updates, but the site that sold him the goods, Vitamins.com, didn't want to acknowledge his e-mail address. So he tried the "unsubscribe" link that came with the promos. He received automated replies promising him it would be taken care of immediately—yet the e-mails kept coming. He called customer service twice, and both times reps couldn't find him in the database. The e-mail invasion continued. In December he contacted a manager by phone. That did the trick. Spam is normally associated with no-name outfits offering porn and get-rich-quick schemes. Corporate spam is more insidious, cramming your in-box with unwanted e-mails from reputable companies you might have contacted before. Clicking on "unsubscribe" often doesn't end the digital invasion. Web sites blame the intrusions on technical problems and marketer's temptation—your online account is simply too valuable for them to let go of it. "The entire business-to-consumer community has been soiled by these latching-on Web sites. This is the modern-day version of the guest from hell who just won't go home," says Kenneth McGee, an analyst at Gartner Group (nyse: IT - news - people). HealthCentral (nasdaq: HCEN - news - people), which owns Vitamins.com, blames the unwanted overtures on outside vendors it contracted with for e-mail administration. The company wouldn't say who exactly was responsible. For Seattle-based Classmates.com, a subscription-based site that for $30 a year lets you reconnect with your high school buddies, following up with unrequested newsletters was irresistible, whether a member wanted them or not. "It started off as a way to validate someone's e-mail address, and it just kind of morphed into sending them other things as well," says Classmates President Michael Schutzler. He halted the practice when he joined the company last September, prompting his employees to give him a standing ovation. A new industry has sprung up to stop such detritus (and cash in at the same time). Targeted marketers like YesMail sign up customers with the promise that they can tailor the pitches they receive—only Caribbean cruises, for example—and for how long. Mailshell of Santa Clara, Calif. offers targeted ads and acts as your unsubscriber enforcer for anything you sign up for. If a junk e-mail you didn't request tries to poke through, Mailshell asks if you want it. Say no, and the unwanted guest is sent packing. Starting next month you will be able to track which sites give your e-mail address to others. As you surf the Web, Mailshell will allow you to register with a unique address for each site. At Amazon.com you could sign up as amazon@janedoe.mailshell.com. All e-mails from Amazon will be delivered to that address at Mailshell—and if e-mails from, say, Drugstore.com (an Amazon partner) start popping up in your Amazon pseudonym, you know Amazon sold your name down the river. (The company reserves the right to sell customer data if all or part of Amazon is sold. Customers can refuse to join the new mail lists, Amazon says, but it's never as easy as it seems.) Sidebar Clicks Falling on Dead Ears. -
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