Open letter to vistaprint.com: Stop the Spam!
“Claim 250 Full-Color Business Cards FREE!” it screams at me every few days. Vistaprint.com is giving away those 250 Business Cards, because they know you’ll like the quality and will come back for more.
What they don’t know is that people are getting fed up with the constant stream of spam advertising their service. So here’s an open letter to those guys at vistaprint.com
Dear vistaprint.com,
it looks like some of your “Refer-A-Friend” participants are seeing the whole world as their friend and advertise your service in form of bulk-email to milions of people. This is rather annoying.
In reading through your “Refer-A-Friend” Terms and Conditions (go to the VistaPrint Help Section and select “Refer-a-Friend Terms and Conditions” in the right column) I can see under point 7 (quote):
7. If a Referring Customer provides a Personal Link to another person by email, the email must be created and distributed in a personal manner that is appropriate and customary for communications with friends and family members. Bulk email distribution, distribution to strangers, or any other promotion of a Personal Link in a manner that would constitute or appear to constitute unsolicited commercial email or “spam” under any applicable law or regulation is expressly prohibited and will be grounds for immediate termination of the Referring Customer’s account and deactivation of the Personal Link.
This makes me believe that you don’t like the way that your services are advertised via the message I receive every few days.
Would you be able to investigate whether those messages are being sent under the umbrella of bluk-mail and whether there is a way to stop the sender from bombarding us?
Here’s a small snapshot of the mails I received over the last few weeks:
What all those spam messages seem to have in common is that they refer to the bigdls.com and 4grtdlz.com domains. Here are just the last few ones (obviously not linked):
- http://rlmeeamsem.bigdls.com/icgkfet.html
- http://vtcggkczgc.bigdls.com/zfmnfwm.html
- http://loswwfszws.bigdls.com/pxkipqk.html
- http://zvbwwpbswb.bigdls.com/zfmwwpm.html
- http://eraeeuabea.bigdls.com/yqmvqqw.html
- http://zvbwwpbswb.bigdls.com/icfgebk.html
- http://tuxhhexvhx.bigdls.com/glktslk.html
- http://xbskkwscks.4grtdlz.com/kxjbmmj.html
- http://loswwfszws.4grtdlz.com/oanauoa.html
I followed the mind-blowing sequence of redirects for each one of them. Here’s just one example for the first link:
$ GET -x http://rlmeeamsem.bigdls.com/icgkfet.html
LWP::UserAgent::new: ()
LWP::UserAgent::request: ()
LWP::UserAgent::send_request: GET http://rlmeeamsem.bigdls.com/icgkfet.html
LWP::UserAgent::_need_proxy: Not proxied
LWP::Protocol::http::request: ()
LWP::Protocol::collect: read 302 bytes
LWP::UserAgent::request: Simple response: Found
LWP::UserAgent::request: ()
LWP::UserAgent::send_request: GET http://c.azjmp.com/az/ch.php?f=586&i=162
LWP::UserAgent::_need_proxy: Not proxied
LWP::Protocol::http::request: ()
LWP::Protocol::collect: read 110 bytes
LWP::UserAgent::request: Simple response: OK
<Script language = javascript> window.location.href=’http://c.azjmp.com/az/ch.php?f=625&i=162&sub=‘;</script>
$ GET -x ‘http://c.azjmp.com/az/ch.php?f=625&i=162&sub=’
LWP::UserAgent::new: ()
LWP::UserAgent::request: ()
LWP::UserAgent::send_request: GET http://c.azjmp.com/az/ch.php?f=625&i=162&sub=
LWP::UserAgent::_need_proxy: Not proxied
LWP::Protocol::http::request: ()
LWP::Protocol::collect: read 120 bytes
LWP::UserAgent::request: Simple response: Found
LWP::UserAgent::request: ()
LWP::UserAgent::send_request: GET http://www.azoogleads.com/az/ch.php?f=625&i=162&sub=&pop=&aux=&bypass=
LWP::UserAgent::_need_proxy: Not proxied
LWP::Protocol::http::request: ()
LWP::Protocol::collect: read 412 bytes
LWP::UserAgent::request: Simple response: OK
<SCRIPT LANGUAGE=”JavaScript”>
function randwin() {
allwin=window.open(”http://c.azjmp.com/az/ch.php?pop=0&f=548&i=162&sub=popup”,’TheNewpop’,'toolbar=1,location=1,directories=1,status=1,menubar=1,scrollbars=1,resizable=1′);
allwin.blur();
window.focus();
}
randwin()
</SCRIPT>
<Script language = javascript>
window.location.href=’http://www.vistaprint.com/vp/gateway.asp?S=7979826309‘;
</script>
$
You can see that after this sequence of redirects (and a popup madness on the screen), we end up on your site with the URL: http://www.vistaprint.com/vp/gateway.asp?S=7979826309. - could it be that the “7979826309″ is a referral ID which allows you to track down the source of this spam-message and thus the spam-sender? All those other bigdls.com and 4grtdlz.com URLs above also end up on your site with the same referral ID.
Would it also be possible to apply your “Refer-A-Friend” Terms and Conditions to this particular friend and make sure that we are not receiving any more Spam from this source?
Regards
Tobias
Dear Tobias,
Thank you for brining this to our attention. I’ve contacted the partner responsible for these repetitive emails. I want you to know that we will do everything in our power to add this person to our suppression list and also have him added to our partner opt-out lists, however, I need their email address. Is this something you can provide to me?
To Whom it may concern:
I got this by an advertisement saying “Get a $100 Restaurant Gift Card Free Dine out Free with $100 Gift Card to a restaurant. Simply… c.azjmp.com. It did not say how or why, just gave the website. Please let me know about the gift card, I would like to go out to eat since I have a life threatening illness and it seems no one even cares what is going to happen, they are into the now, not then phase. I guess they think I am made of money, but really I need money to get a Kidney.
Nadine
I have ordered business cards and address labels from Vista Print and each time I order, I pay for the printing. This does not seem to be enough. I almost always get a charge on my debt card checking account for $12.95 from Business Max which is an affilate of Vista Print. When I called Business Max they said I signed up for their service through a survey from Vista Print. If this is not illegal, it certainly is unethical. I never knew I was becoming a member of some business buying club.
Man of sick of this fucking vistaprint! I signed up for those free cards, but then decided not to bother because they were crap, now I cant stop their bastard emails from arriving every day arrghh
Yeah - now they’re spamming every single day! It’s the first email to arrive in the morning. They make a decent product, but their spam makes me not want to use them anymore.
i found your site through a google search because i need to spread the word about these people. their products are so cheap because they continue making money off of you after your purchase. so far i have found that they sell your phone number, i was getting sales calls up to 5 times a day by the same number and through a little googling found that everyone who was getting called by the same set of numbers ordered through vistaprint. i also strongly believe that they sell your email address to spammers. i used an email that i normally do not use when i ordered the cards and now all of the spam i receive 15-30 per day has some sort of design term in the subject line. i don’t know if there is any way to prove that the spammers received my info from vista but at this moment i am ready to yell wolf. DO NOT USE THESE SLIMY BASTARDS! oh, and they have no email, no reply to form, only a customer service number that is forwarded to an answering service where no one speaks english as a native language.
I also found your site through google.
It seems the email spam and junk mail in my mailbox is no longer enough, they have taken to calling with recorded messages. The product was pretty good, but not worth all this.
I called today to let them know that I will be taking legal action if this continues. No email support on website, so I was on hold for 20 minutes and again ended up with an offshore answering service.
I’ve got to go with michael. Avoid this company!
I got tired of their SPAM so I called them to complain. I was given a supervisor’s email address. I wrote to the person asking them to remove me from their list. She asked what address I had signed up with them on and I told them I had not signed up with them. Here was their response:
***********
Hello Mr. Taylor,
I searched for your account using this email address and was not able to locate an account with this email address. As a result I can only advise you to click on the link on the email that says the following:
If you do not want to receive e-mails concerning VistaPrint products,
please click here.
Regards,
Sharon Lewis
Team Lead
VistaPrint
Design, Sales & Service
slewis@vistaprint.com
**************************
Feel free to re-direct VistaPrint SPAM to Sharon, perhaps she will get the message!
Today I bought the business cards for a business I’m setting out and also in their advertizing they advertized a web site for $4.99 a month. I didn’t think this was possible but I tried anyway. When I was in the middle of constructing the web site, I suddenly lost the page. When I called for help, it was a nightmare. They were sending me the order to my address but my account was under somebodyelses’ name. Therefore they couldn’t tell me anything. When I tried to cancel I was told that I couldn’t do it. These people are scammers all right. Please send this comment to Ms Lewis. I’ll do the same.
Just sent this email to Amazon.co.uk:
“Hi
I have been ordering from Amazon for many years and was always very happy with your service. But some time ago I received a flyer with one of my orders with a supposed offer from VistaPrint. Since creating an account with them (VistaPrint) I am literally being bombarded with their spam which includes ‘offers’ who only an idiot can fall for!!!
If you google for “VistaPrint and Amazon.co.uk” you will notice that there are already many angry people who have been cheated by this company. So if you (Amazon) want to ruin your good reputation that you have been building for the past 10 years then go ahead and keep on making partnerships with companies like VistaPrint!!!!!”
anyone got an answer to stop vistaprint emails?
I have been getting spam daily from someone with no previous contact with VistaPrint. I see where they give spam-cash for business sent there way through these spammers. I sent the spam link that probably has a code to them through a ‘feedback’ form on their site, as well as on a form to order catalogs, and then forwarded their letter to Abuse@vistaprint.com, which bounced, then to ‘webmaster@vistaprint.com’, which worked.
That’s too funny, Google placed vistaprint ads on the right side of this page. They have to pay click through so I’ll click it and make some money for Google, as if they need it, and cost vistaPrint some.
Another way to find vistaprint email addresses to contact is to log onto your account (or make a new one)
Then change your details and put in new email address - use a vistaprint.com address eg bbrown@vistaprint.com and you will get a message back saying that this address is already taken.
Voila you have a vistaprint email address
They seem to use initial then surname as their naming conventions
I have emailed them today. This week alone they have sent me 7 emails. I’ve told them that they’re not advertising, they’re spamming. Hopefully they’ll remove me from their mailing list.
Hey guys, here’s another way to obtain a VP email address. Click on the forgot PW link. They’ll email you a new one and you’ll get an address. Here’s the one I got… VistaPrint@e.vistaprint.com
Good Luck everyone!
They stopped the emails - until this week, I got another bloody one. Something should be done about these idiots.
I am getting regular spam tricking me into buying stuff from for Vistaprint. See copy of latest spam below. This is the 5th email I’ve received, even though I have never signed up to any emails from this affiliate, Clickpromise.com.
This is the same company sending out spam which has been doing so for years. They are known as Primeq and also Clickpromise.
I found this just now - http://www.scam.com/showthread.php?t=9258
Primeq’s clickpromise are also exposed for sending out spam by Wired Magazine, as you can see on this page -
http://www.wired.com/culture/lifestyle/news/2005/06/67709?currentPage=2
Spam is coming from Clickpromise at:
Corporation No: C2999245, Address: 26035 Acero, Suite 150, Mission Viejo, CA 95391, California, USA
Domain name they are using is:
http://www.thedeliverycompany.com
Company owner is:
Jason Mcclain