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Amazon mistakenly sends baby registry emails

Posted at 9:09 PM, Sep 19, 2017
and last updated 2017-09-19 21:09:54-04

Finding out that someone has bought you a present is almost always awesome. Unless that gift is for your unborn child and you are, as far as you know, not expecting.

Amazon sent out some very confusing emails on Tuesday, telling a large number of customers that someone had bought an item off their baby registry. Many of the recipients did not have a baby registry — let alone a baby gestating or any plans to have or adopt a baby.

“A gift is on the way” read the email, which was impersonally addressed to “Amazon Customer.” The email had a large link inviting the recipient to view their thank you list. For many it redirected them to a page on which they could set up a new registry. Some were taken to a broken link. It’s likely that some of the recipients actually had registries and are now just disappointed that a friend did not in fact buy them something tiny.

The email looked like a phishing email, with a stock-photo baby crawling off the side. However it was in fact from Amazon and none of the links have been found to be suspicious. Some people on social media joked that theretail giant might know more about their reproductive status than they did.

An Amazon spokesperson said a technical glitch caused the company to “inadvertently send a gift alert e-mail earlier today,” and that Amazon was alerting affected customers.

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