Blog

“A guy walks into a bar . . . .” It’s a typical set-up for a stand-up comedian, but we never thought it would be the opener about a proposed FTC settlement involving unproven treatment claims for serious diseases. Texas-based A&O Enterprises, iV Bars, and owner Aaron Roberts sell and administer intravenous “cocktails” – bags containing mixtures of water, vitamins, minerals, and amino acids administered through an IV drip. Customers who visit an...

We’ll grudgingly give this to Innovative Paycheck Solutions and FakePayStubOnline.com. The California-based operation owned by Katrina Moore really did sell fake bank statements, W-2s, profit and loss statements, and “other income verification documents” – although we’re still trying to get our head around the oxymoronic advertising claim that the site sold “Authentic Fake Pay Stubs!” The site offered a host of customized options including...

As the song goes, “A house is not a home.” And as alleged in an FTC lawsuit against the operators of rental listing websites, sometimes an apartment isn’t an apartment. Steven Shayan, Kevin Shayan, and affiliated companies run ApartmentHunterz.com, FeaturedRentals.com, and WeTakeSection8.com. For consumers who pay weekly or monthly subscription fees, the defendants promise accurate listings for available units. For example, ApartmentHunterz.com...

The FTC just announced a Made in USA hat trick: two proposed settlements and a final order arising from allegedly deceptive claims by a New York hockey puck seller, a California-based backpack business, and an online mattress company. The message for marketers? Given the importance of country-of-origin representations to many consumers, companies can expect the FTC to call offsides on misleading Made in USA claims. Patriot Puck, owner George...

Last month, Judge Tanya S. Chutkan of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia granted the FTC’s Motion for Preliminary Injunction, halting Wilhelmsen’s proposed acquisition of Drew Marine following a 10-day hearing. The opinion, a redacted version of which is now public, contains insights on esoteric but important areas of merger analysis of interest to antitrust practitioners, namely cluster markets, product markets for...

Court orders against 13 related corporate and individual defendants involved in a Georgia-based debt collection operation bring to mind the 1980s chart-topping group from Australia, Crowded House. That’s because now that Advanced Mediation Group’s enterprise has been shuttered, the FTC’s “house” of individuals and corporations banned for life from the debt collection industry just got a little more crowded. According to the FTC, one of the...

Where do people go when considering careers in the military? Online, of course. Based on the search terms they selected, they often found themselves on sites like army.com, armyenlist.com, and similar URLs for other branches of the service. But according to an FTC complaint against Sun Key Publishing, Fanmail.com, and related defendants, what was going on behind the scenes of those sites will surprise you. Another notable aspect of the case: the...

Longfellow said “It takes less time to do a thing right than to explain why you did it wrong.” We agree, especially when it comes to designing effective merger remedies—ones that maintain competition at pre-merger levels so that the merger does not lead to higher prices, lower quality, or reduced innovation. From the perspective of the Bureau of Competition and the Commission, getting it right takes time. The Bureau and the Commission review the...

When an emergency strikes, your business’s most vulnerable asset may not be in the stockroom or warehouse. It could be the data that has been central to your success. September is National Preparedness Month. The FTC has six steps you can take to help protect your company’s information from the unpredictable. Conduct an information inventory. While the skies are sunny, take an inventory of the data critical to your business – customer lists...

Thinking about replacing a company car or truck? Unless you take some security steps before selling the vehicle, you could be leaving behind a water bottle or two, some change under the seat – and a massive amount of corporate and personal data. Systems in newer cars do a great job keeping you and your employees connected while on the road. But like laptops and smartphones, your company cars may be storing more information than you realize – data...