Merchants held liable for Affiliates SPAM???

[Linda Buquet]

This newsstory that broke today in the International Herald Tribune signifies a growing problem that could affect merchants with affiliate programs.
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Microsoft and Eliot Spitzer, the New York state attorney general, each filed suits on Thursday charging one of the country's most prominent e-mail marketers with fraud stemming from sending unsolicited commercial e-mail, commonly known as spam.
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The lawsuits, the most prominent in a recent flurry of legal efforts to attack spammers, are expected to shed light on the complex web of relationships and technologies behind such e-mail. They also represent an attempt to hold responsible not just those accused of sending e-mail fraudulently, but also those who financially benefit.
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The charges against Richter and others go to the issue of whether marketers of products or services can be held responsible for the methods used by independent affiliates to sell their wares.

Read the full article and then come back to discuss.
http://www.iht.com/articles/122135.html

Should merchants be held liable for the actions of their affiliates?

[lisan]

Affiliate Programs should have a policy for affiliates that unsolicited emails is prohibited. If the affiliate agrees to this policy when he/she registered for the program and later on spam to market product, then the affiliate is solely responsible for it. However, if the Affiliate Program doesn't have a anti-spam policy, then both are held accountable.

[voodooboy]

Should merchants be held liable for the actions of their affiliates?

Yes. An affiliate is a representative of your company, product and or service. They are in a sense a sub-contractor of the merchant.

Until the merchant takes a strong look at the people that sign up for their affiliate programs, and take responsibility for their own marketing efforts, then yes, the merchant should be liable.

Sense everybody seems to think it is the end users responsibility to deal with SPAM, if they would take the time to report the spam directly to the profiting merchant, then the merchant might have better control over their affiliates.

The truth of the matter is, until the merchant is held responsible for some part of the spamming issues, they will continue to turn their heads and claim ignorance. Most affiliate based companies don’t care how the money comes in, as long as it comes in.