How can you trust a company you don't know?

[Nicholas Diotte <xphox () xphox net>]

Greetings List,

Recently I've been asked to look into a product, that a company I've never heard of sells.  The company in question has 
a service that our Marketing Department would like to purchase.  It being computer related, IT gets final say.

Basically this company is advertising, "Fully-Branded Emails".  Currently we restrict our Marketing Dept. from using 
"fancy" HTML emails, and only allow them to send plain text.  However this company will allow them to send Rich Text, 
and HTML emails.  They will even provide what seems to be impossible reporting, dynamic content (via database), and 
custom emails based on user interaction (in other words profiling).  Basically I'm assuming each email will contain 
embedded hidden pictures, etc that will track what users are doing.  A little scarry for me, as the last thing I want 
is our company emails being picked up by spyware scanners, etc..

I've done some basic research on the company and they do seem rather legitamite, however I have found traces of them on 
a couple mail abuse lists.

Basically it's an opt-in newsletter, how it works is you give them a subdomain, and point the MX record to their 
mailserver.  But how do I know they won't spam from our domain, how do I know they won't sell the opt-in list, and what 
about user tracking...  Do I have to alert our subscribers that they will in fact be "profiled"?

What steps would you take if you needed to look into a company and give a report to your VPs, giving the product a 
yeah, or nah.

Thanks,
--Xphox

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