Herndon-based Internet domain registrar Network Solutions Inc. said it will apologize to tens of thousands of customers whose e-mail addresses the company inadvertently released yesterday.
"A few thousand" Network Solutions customers received e-mail messages that contained more than 85,000 e-mail addresses of other Network Solutions customers, said spokesman Patrick Burns of VeriSign Inc., the parent company of Network Solutions.
"We made a mistake, and we"ll apologize to our customers," Burns said.
The list was sent to Network Solutions customers who purchased ".org" addresses through the company; it included customers whose addresses begin with the letters R through Z. Network Solutions had intended to send the recipients a message about how a recent transition in .org management would affect their accounts.
Not all the people whose addresses were included in the e-mail received the message, which was prepared by Network Solutions staffers, Burns said.