A company that sells sunglasses has been fined more than $1.5m for spamming Australians with more than 200,000 texts and emails.
Luxottica, owner of the OPSM, Oakley and Sunglass Hut brands, was found to have sent customers 91,231 marketing emails without a working way to unsubscribe to them.
The probe by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) found that during the same time, November 2022 and May 2023, Luxottica also sent 112,348 texts and emails to customers who had unsubscribed from such messages.
Authority Member Samantha Yorke said it was particularly bad to keep spamming customers after they had gone to the effort to unsubscribe.
“Businesses must keep up their side of the bargain and stop sending these messages when customers ask them to,” Yorke said.
“Once emails include this kind of marketing content they are commercial under the spam rules and must include the option to unsubscribe from further messages.
“It is unacceptable to include advertising or promotional material if a customer has no way to opt out of receiving these messages.”
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Around half of the emails sent without the option to unsubscribe were order confirmations and password reset messages that also included or linked to clearly commercial content, such as how to view and buy Oakley products and a free shipping promotion, the authority said.
The firm paid a $1,512,500 penalty.
The ACMA has also accepted a comprehensive three-year court-enforceable undertaking from Luxottica committing it to appoint an independent consultant to review its compliance with spam rules.
Luxottica must also report to the ACMA.
This action follows other enforcement against other companies that have breached the spam unsubscribe laws, including Uber, Outdoor Supacentre and Kmart.
“We strongly urge all companies engaging in e-marketing in Australia to check their compliance systems are working and effective to prevent spamming consumers,” said Yorke.
Over the last 18 months businesses have paid more than $12.7 million in spam and telemarketing penalties.
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