Class Action Lawsuits are Hitting Email Marketers – Get Compliant Now!

As I am sure many of you are aware, there exist many individuals known in the industry as “professional email litigators” whose businesses involve seeding datasets so that they (or their clients) will receive commercial email advertisements through third party publishers. They collect and categorize the commercial email into network and publisher holding files. When they have enough, they will insert claims against the advertiser in the email who will in turn look to the network for indemnification who will in turn look to the publisher for indemnification. Until now, these have been resolved relatively easily. However, there are now class action attorneys involved in this area of litigation. A class action litigation is a form of lawsuit in which one or two people bring a lawsuit on behalf of a large group of unknown people. In email marketing, this means that one or two emails can result in million dollar verdicts. Every publisher and network should heed warning of the nature of these lawsuits and take immediate action on any suppression alerts identifying known litigant email records. This also underscores the importance for the development, implementation and routine reviews of compliance-focused processes surrounding data management and ad content/copy compliance. Retention of a reputable outside or corporate counsel knowledgeable of the industry can be invaluable and is recommended when developing or reviewing such processes.