Spammers access customer email addresses?

Probably stolen by hackers, but company isn't acknowledging

[MichaelBluejay]

I use a unique, specially coded email address with each company I do business with so that if I start getting spam, I can tell exactly which company played fast and loose with my email address. That rarely happens with the larger, established companies, but it just happened with Vonage, which I had promoted as an affiliate until now.

Note that the spam isn't promoting Vonage, it's promoting some junk get rich quick scheme. The spammer wants me to call him to learn how I can make $1500 to $3500 per day.

I called Vonage to inquire whether (1) they sold me out to spammers, or (2) hackers stole the info from their database, but predictably Vonage refused to acknowledge that either could have been the case. The agent said, and I quote, "Maybe your domain [sic] sold your address."

I emailed a lengthy complaint to Vonage, but I'm not holding my breath about getting a meaningful response.

In the past when companies have been hacked and customer credit card info has been stolen, the companies go public with that info. I think this situation is similar, and customers should be informed that their info has been compromised.

[edited by: eljefe3 at 2:52 am (utc) on July 3, 2006]

[kwngian]

It could also simply means that one of their PC is infected with a trojan and the trojan harvests the email addresses on the infected machine's address book and then mail it back to the trojan author.

It happens with one of my client, so I am sure this is one way hardly used email addresses could be getting spam mails.

[jomaxx]

If someone stole your credit card info, I'd say you're right, but an email address isn't secure. If they've ever sent you anything over the Internet using that address, then there are ways for the address to be discovered by third parties.

Anyway when credit card info is stolen, the public must be notified because there are useful precautions that can be taken, even if it's simply watching out for unauthorized purchases. With email addresses, there's little expectation of privacy and there's nothing you can do about it.

[MichaelBluejay]

What I would expect would be the company to take the report seriously and investigate whether and how their customers' email addresses were compromised. What bothers me is not that the addresses got compromised, but that Vonage doesn't seem to care.

As for the address being pilfered from the net in transit, I admit it's possible, but I have dozens and dozens of other addresses that have never been stolen that way, so it seems unlikely.