Consumer Research Corporation / Subscriberbase ripoff apparently very wide scale spammer offers of free merchandise outright lie Columbia South Carolina
Thank GOD for another complaintant against these people for publishing these creep's phone number! I am located in the same city as this band of spammers, and even armed with an address, was able to track down a phone number for these purveyors of internet fraud only after it was published by another complaintant.
I own & operate a small truck brokerage company that is very internet dependant, as my customers tender business to me via e-mail & fax. (Ironically enough in this situation, I also receive my faxes via an e-mail fax service).
While reviewing my e-mails one morning several months back, I was suckered into doing a "product survey" with the promise of a "free" laptop computer. (I am not only a trusting soul, but an outright idiot to fall for this "free stuff" crap.)
Anyway, after being suckered into answering page after page of "survey" questions, I finally hit the part of the "survey" to where I had to buy something in order to get my "free" laptop computer. Honestly, by this time I had nearly forgotten the promise of "free" anything. Anyway, once I realized I was being scammed, I exited the website, but it was too late. These creeps had my business e-mail address and my personal information, which thay had obtained by 100% deception!
Since that fateful morning, my business e-mail has been bombarded with 30 - 50 pieces of spam mail daily from these creeps. I now have to sort through all of their "free" offers & such to get to my legitimate e-mails.
And of course, Consumer Research Corporation uses every spammers trick in the book to weasel their way into my e-mail box. I opt to "block sender" on each and every piece of spam I get from these jerks, but they simply change a letter or 2 in their sender address and it gets through.
They offer very complicated round about ways to opt out of their mailing lists, which I have tried without any success. Some of the "opt out" links I have followed at their instructions havr locked down my computer, causing me to have to do a hard restart. Today, their phone number was published on the www much to my delight. I called and asked to speak to the person in charge. I was told that his name is Brian Benenhaley, that he was busy at the moment, but if I would leave my number, he would call me back. Of course I did, and HE DIDN'T. I guess that Mr. Benenhaley is a busy man that doesn't have time for me!
I am also a busy man, the owner of a small business that has spent countless hours, sent hundreds of returned e-mails (begging them to stop spamming me) and endured a great measure of grief trying to get these people to leave me alone. So, I am all for turning Mr. Benenhaley and his band of lying deceptive spammers over to the FTC for their fraudulent practices. I hope that eveyone that has had a problem with Consumer Research Corporation will do the same!
John
Columbia, South Carolina
U.S.A.
2 Updates & Rebuttals
John
Columbia,South Carolina,
U.S.A.
Consumer Research has far and beyond too many aka's and aliases to mention here.
#3Author of original report
Mon, December 27, 2004
This is a follow up to a report originally filed on 11/23/04 or thereabouts, against the cyber jerks at Consumer Research Corporation. Consumer Research has far and beyond too many aka's and aliases to mention here. You will of course notice the multitude of complaints filed against them on ripoff report.com .
Anyway, after finally getting the company attorney, John Frink on the telephone, I DID get some action. Believe me, I put the fear of God into Mr. Frink, as his company was violating just about every privacy and anti spam law on the books. Mr Frink went through the entire SUBSCRIBERBASE system (subscriberbase is the actual name of the company that CONSUMER RESEARCH CORPORATION operates under) and manually removed my e-mail address from their many many mailing lists.
The only problem was (and is) that by the time I tracked down the cyber creeps at Subscriberbase as being the responsible party for all the spamming, they (the people at subscriberbase) had SOLD my e-mail address and personal information to God only knows how many other spam artists! And, of course these spammers had sold the info to other spammers, who in turn had sold it to other spammers, who had sold it to other spammers, and so on and so on......
Consumer Research Corporation (subscriberbase) had created an exponential monster that was absolutely unstopable! Some of the cyber trash that they sold me out to were so tacky and trashy that when you followed the "unsubscribe" links they furnished with their e-mails, you were actually inviting your computer to download a virus that would totally wipe out your hard drive. This eventually DID happen to me, but with little consequence, as I back up every little sliver of vital data EVERY SINGLE DAY! I DID have to take the time to reload my entire operating system, as well as all my programs and RAM data!
This happened only once, however there were other, less virilunt virus that invaded my computer by the same means that my Norton Utilities was able to remove without harm to my files.
Bear in mind here, I am not accusing Consumer Research Corporation or Subscriberbase of spreading these viruses, but I AM accusing those cyber thugs that Consumer Research & Subscriberbase sold my e-mail address to.
I am sure that you all are aware of how this all gets started, if you have read any of the other complaints posted here. Consumer Research offers "FREE" merchandise in exchange for your participation in their product "surveys". After they have obtained your e-mail address and other personal information, they put the bite on you and reveal that to obtain the "FREE" merchandise, you must "BUY" some other stuff from them. (Which of course negates anything "FREE" about the entire scam!)
I was one of the rare people who got so totally ticked off about the whole thing that I spent the time to track down the cyber thugs at Consumer Research. (They, as it turned out are in the same town as I am!!) In their defense, I WILL say that their attorney DID make an effort to get my name off of the spam list. However, after I determined that his efforts were too little, too late and things heated up a bit, the attorney, Mr. Frink asked what he could do to make things right by me. I said that I would like to have the new IBM Laptop that was used to sucker me into the deal to begin with! There was a long period of silent hesitaion; then Mr. Frink told me that he just couldn't do this.
Then, I asked if anyone had EVER received an IBM Laptop from them. Again, a painfully tense period of silent hesitaion, and then I was told that "that information was not available."
This question was eventually posed to Mr. Brian Benenhaley, president of Suscriberbase and Consumer Research Corporation, this time by Barbara Whittaker,a reporter for the New York Times, who was gathering information for an investigative artice about cyber ripoffs. Mr. Benenhaley declined to say how many computers and other valuables had actually been given away citing "competitive reasons". He told Ms. Whittaker something to the effect that he would have "satified participants" contact her. NONE DID!(Ms. Whittaker's story ran in the December 26, 2004 edition of the NY Times, and featured my story as well as a few others.) It did not portray Consumer Research in a very positive light.
I eventually shut down the address that was trashed by Consumer Research and the people they sold the address to. It was costly. It was primarily a business address used to receive orders. In retrospect, I DID receive something VERY valuable for my participation in Consumer Research Corporation's "product survey". What I received was a lesson. A lesson that my dear father tried to teach me when I was a child. That is: NOTHING IS FREE; and IF IT LOOKS TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE, IT IS! Morover, the valuable lesson I learned for this experience was by no means "FREE". The cost could be measured by my time lost from my business, and the orders that my customers tried to place via e-mail, only to receive their mail back with a message: "Addressee's mail storage limit exeeded. Try again later" It seems that my mailbox was too full of Consumer Research's SPAM!
John
Columbia, South Carolina
U.S.A.
Catherine
Harker Heights,Texas,
U.S.A.
Consumer Research Corporation is falsely advertising
#3Consumer Comment
Tue, November 23, 2004
I recieved several e-mails offering free gifts. I ignored the first few and then decided, what the heck. I started their "survey" only to have to go through offer upon offer of which you are to sign up for and pay for in order to recieve this "FREE GIFT". By then end of it I'm sure I could just outright buy whatever they offer for any given "survey" on E-bay TWICE! Since I listed my e-mail address on their survey, I have been bombarded by e-mails from this company and others affiliated with them. They falsely give the impression that you simply have to fill out a survey in order to recieve these gifts but that is not the case. Another way they try to deceive you is by operating under different names. Stay away from them!