FTC Highlights Actions to Protect Consumers from Impersonation Scams

The Federal Trade Commission today highlighted actions taken to protect consumers from impersonations scams since the Government and Business Impersonation Rule took effect in April 2024. Scams impersonating businesses and government are consistently among the top frauds reported to the FTC; these scams resulted in $2.95 billion in consumer losses in 2024.

Image

In the first year since the Rule went into effect, the FTC has brought five cases involving alleged violations and shut down 13 websites that were illegally impersonating the Commission online.

“The billions of dollars American consumers lose at the hands of impersonators is staggering,” said Chris Mufarrige, Director of the Bureau of Consumer Protection. “The FTC will not hesitate to enforce the Impersonation Rule against bad actors.”

The Impersonation Rule makes it illegal to:

• materially and falsely pose as a government entity or officer, in or affecting commerce; or materially misrepresent affiliation with a government entity, in or affecting commerce; and
• materially and falsely pose as, directly or by implication, a business or officer thereof, in or affecting commerce; or materially misrepresent, directly or by implication, affiliation with, including endorsement or sponsorship by, a business or officer thereof, in or affecting commerce.

Companies or individuals that violate the Impersonation Rule may be required to pay refunds to affected consumers and civil penalties of up to $53,088 per violation.

Enforcement Actions

Over the past year, the FTC has brought law enforcement actions under the Impersonation Rule against: Click Profit (e-commerce business opportunity scheme); Superior Servicing, LLC (student loan debt relief scheme); Panda Benefit Services, LLC (student loan debt relief scheme); and Blackstone Legal (phantom debt collection).

The FTC’s complaint against Superior Servicing LLC, for example, alleges that the company pretended to be affiliated with the U.S. Department of Education and falsely promised student loan forgiveness, taking millions from student loan borrowers. In November, a federal court temporarily halted the scheme and froze its assets at the request of the FTC, which is seeking a permanent ban on the defendants’ deceptive practices.

FTC Online Impersonators

In addition, the FTC worked over the past year with domain registrars to take down websites impersonating the FTC and sent letters to domain registrars of such websites, requesting their immediate removal.

In response to the letters, the registrars took down 13 websites, including: 1) ftc.reportfraud.tech; 2) myftc.info/reportfraud; 3) reporfraud-ftc-gov.online; 4) ftc.reportfraud.work; 5) ftc.reportfraud.site 6) FTCEUrecovery.com; 7) ftc-gov.us; 8) ftcfr.org; 9) contactftc.com;10) federaltradecommission.org; 11) usrecoverysystem.com; 12) capitaltraceability.com; and 13) ftcgrant.com.