Firm fined £140,000 for sending spam texts

A WELSH marketing firm has been fined for sending more than four million spam texts.

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) found that PRS Media, which trades as Purus Digital, did not have the consent of the 4.4m people it sent marketing texts to and was fined £140,000.

Purus Digital, in Dale, Haverfordwest, is said to have used information obtained from its own competition website to send the text messages.

People were required to sign up to marketing as a condition of entering competitions on the firm’s website but this is not regarded as proper consent.

The website’s privacy policy told people their details would be shared with third parties but the law says that is not specific enough. Customers are required to give consent to receive marketing text messages. The law says people must have a genuine choice over whether or not to consent to marketing.

Ken Macdonald, head of ICO Regions, said: “Nuisance marketing, whether it’s by calls to people’s landline or mobile, or through spam texts, causes disruption, annoyance and, in the worst cases, serious upset.

“We issue fines like these to firms behind nuisance marketing to send a clear message that such action will not be tolerated.

“The ICO is looking forward to the commencement of our new powers, announced by the government last year, which will allow us to fine the directors of firms, as well as the companies.

“This will enable us to take even more of a stand against the firms causing intrusion.”