Commonwealth Securities Limited (CommSec) has become the third major Australian organisation to fall foul of the Spam Act, after three recipients of marketing emails complained to the ACMA.


The organisation has given the ACMA a legal enforceable undertaking and agreed to pay the ACMA $55,000.

Last October, Vodafone Hutchison Australia (VHA) and Coca Cola South Pacific received similar treatment following the distribution of SMS marketing messages for Coca Cola by Vodafone prior to its merger with Hutchison. (Coca Cola however got away with only a warning).

According to the undertaking, CommSec sent 6.8 million commercial electronic messages to its customers in the 12 months prior the undertaking. The ACMA says it received three complaints from recipients alleging that their messages did not contain an unsubscribe facility and/or that their attempts to unsubscribe were unsuccessful.

Following these complaints, the ACMA says it "identified that email campaigns conducted by CommSec in January, February and March 2009, did not provide an option to unsubscribe."

ACMA chairman, Chris Chapman, said: "CommSec has undertaken to initiate stringent reviews of its systems and processes as a result of this investigation and has demonstrated a commitment to making the internal changes necessary for ongoing compliance with the Spam Act."

An implementation plan has been agreed with the ACMA that includes the appointment of an independent consultant to assess CommSec's system reviews, quarterly audits on its email campaigns for 12 months and the introduction of an annual training programme. CommSec will report regularly to the ACMA on its progress.

Original Source - http://www.itwire.com/telecommunications-news/policy-and-regulation/36434-commsec-clobbered-for-spamming