PubSub results for Federal Trade Commission

Team Cymru Internet Security News

2010-03-10 06:04:00 GMT

"The CEO of Lifelock, Todd Davis, became famous for advertising his Social Security number on television ads and billboards promising his $10 monthly service would protect consumers from identity theft. The company also offered a $1 million guarantee to compensate customers for losses incurred if they became a victim of identity theft after signing up for the service. But the Federal Trade Commission said Tuesday that the claims were bogus (...."

Team Cymru Internet Security News

2010-03-10 06:40:00 GMT

"LifeLock, an Arizona company promising customers protection from identity theft, has agreed to pay $12 million to settle charges that the company overstated its benefits and used "scare tactics" to gain subscribers. Since 2006, LifeLock has promised in television and newspaper advertisements that it would protect customers from ID theft, but a complaint from the U.S. Federal Trade Commission and 35 state attorneys general said the company over-promised what benefits it could provide...."

SacBee -- Business

cbuck@sacbee.com (Claudia Buck) — 2010-03-10 08:00:00 GMT

LifeLock Inc., the identity theft protection company whose ads have widely aired on TV, on radio and in print, must cease "misrepresenting and overstating" its services under a settlement announced Tuesday by state and federal officials.

Thousands of consumers in California and 34 other states who signed up for the company's services in recent years will be eligible to receive $11 million in restitution, according to the announcement by state attorneys general in 35 states and the Federal Trade Commission.

In its lawsuit, the California attorney general's office says LifeLock falsely implied that consumers would be protected against all forms of identity theft, reimbursed directly for losses tied to identity theft and telephoned prior to any new credit being issued in their name. None of those claims, according to the complaint, proved true.

"It's critical that the advertising is not misleading and is not based on false claims and inflated promises," said Evan Westrup, spokesman for the attorney general's office. "The settlement means LifeLock will have to make some serious and substantive changes to the way they advertise their services."

The investigation into LifeLock's business practices was launched amid numerous complaints by consumers nationwide.

The Tempe, Ariz.-based company said it has more than 224,800 enrolled customers in California.

One of LifeLock's former customers, Jesse Swisher, a cell phone technician in Sacramento, said he signed up three years ago after becoming an identity theft victim to someone who stole his bank account information.

"I was hoping it would give me a little relief" after spending hours spent canceling credit cards and bank accounts, Swisher said. But after paying for a year's service, he quickly realized that "most of what they do, we can do on our own as educated consumers." After 45 days, Swisher said he canceled the service and received a full refund.

LifeLock charges $110 for its basic identity theft package. Some of its services, such as putting a freeze on a credit file or requesting an annual credit report, can be done by consumers themselves at no cost.

Under terms of the settlement, the company also must stop overstating the risk of identity theft to individual consumers. According to the attorney general's office, LifeLock often sent letters warning that "You're receiving this (letter) because you may be at risk of identity theft," without any facts or information to substantiate that claim. "They were putting on a hard sell," noted Westrup.

In some ads, LifeLock CEO Todd Davis gave out his own Social Security number, vowing that LifeLock's services would prevent anyone from stealing his identity and opening accounts in his name.

In a statement Tuesday, Davis said LifeLock "is pleased with this agreement, which, for the very first time, works to set advertising guidelines for the entire industry. We welcome federal and state efforts to regulate our industry, because doing so helps to protect consumers from the risks of identity theft."

The company said the settlement involved "old practices and products" that are not part of LifeLock's current services.

Westrup said the attorney general's office and the FTC would be sending out letters in the next two weeks about applying for refunds to former and current customers who purchased LifeLock identity theft services between April 1, 2005, and March 30, 2009.

For more information, visit the FTC's Web site, www.ftc.gov/lifelock, or call (202) 326-3757.

Livescience.com

2010-03-10 23:33:12 GMT

Lifelock has agreed to a $12 million settlement with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC).

WalletPop Blog

Mitch Lipka — 2010-03-10 05:30:00 GMT

Filed under: Identity Theft, Consumer Ally, Credit Reports

LifeLock, Inc., which paraded its CEO's Social Security number on the side of a truck to bolster claims the company could prevent identity theft, reached a $12 million settlement with the Federal Trade Commission and 35 states over misleading advertising charges.

"While LifeLock promised consumers complete protection against all types of identity theft, in truth, the protection it actually provided left enough holes that you could drive a truck through it," FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz said in a written statement.

To settle the charges, the company agreed to stop making claims about how its service could prevent identity theft, monitor all activity of all its customers and to render their personal information useless to identity thieves. And, ironically, the company also had to agree to protect its customers' information, something the FTC said it had been lax about.

Continue reading LifeLock pays $12 million to settle charges the company deceived consumers

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post-gazette.com - News

2010-03-10 05:00:00 GMT

LifeLock Inc. agreed to pay $11 million to the Federal Trade Commission and $1 million to 35 state attorneys general, including in Pennsylvania, to settle charges that the company used false

Articles on National Review Online

webmaster@nationalreview.com (Bill Burck & Dana Perino) — 2010-03-10 08:00:19 GMT

Attorney General Eric Holder and others in the Obama administration have advocated trying Khalid Sheik Muhammed, and acquiring intelligence from Christmas Day bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, in the criminal-justice system. The protections afforded individuals in the criminal-justice system generally exceed those afforded in the military system, so one might think terrorists would be put at an advantage if they are treated as criminals rather than enemy combatants. But we must reject, the president has told us, “the false choice between our security and our ideals.”

It is not unreasonable to expect that a person who is told he has a right to remain silent might exercise that right. Nor is it far-fetched that requiring the unanimous agreement of twelve jurors, as opposed to the vote of two-thirds of the members of a military commission, is more likely to result in an acquittal. But, we are reassured by Holder, there’s little cause for concern, because criminals usually talk when offered leniency and “failure is not an option” with KSM’s trial -- an unusual vow for an attorney general to make about a criminal trial that will be decided by an impartial judge and jury.

The message is simple and absolute: Giving more constitutional rights to suspected terrorists will not impede our efforts to protect national security.

But the attorney general had a different view not so long ago when he was a lawyer in private practice. Back then he understood that Mirandizing terrorists, to choose one example, is not without risk to our national security. In 2004, he joined former attorney general Janet Reno and two other Clinton-era Justice Department and CIA attorneys on an amicus brief (a brief by interested third parties offering views on the legal questions in a case) to the Supreme Court supporting Jose Padilla, the U.S. citizen suspected of working with KSM and others in an al-Qaeda plot to explode a dirty bomb in a U.S. city. The brief can be found here.

TRADEOFFS
The key issue before the Supreme Court was this: Does the president have the authority to hold a U.S. citizen who was captured on U.S. soil as an enemy combatant, without criminal charges? The Bush administration said yes. Padilla, supported by Holder and other interested third parties, said no.

(In another case, the Supreme Court decided that a U.S. citizen captured on the battlefield in Afghanistan could be held as an enemy combatant, but in Padilla, the Court ultimately declined to provide an answer regarding suspected terrorists captured in the U.S. Instead, for other reasons it overturned the lower court, which had ruled in Padilla’s favor, and sent the case to a different court to take a fresh look at the legal issues. Padilla eventually lost that case on appeal.)

In the brief -- whose primary author, incidentally, was Robert Litt, at the time a prominent attorney at a major D.C. law firm and now appointed by President Obama as the intelligence community’s top lawyer -- Holder and company made the argument that traditional law-enforcement tools, such as wiretaps, search warrants, Mirandized questioning, and the like, have served the nation’s security well and were sufficient to do the job. The government need not resort, they argued, to holding terrorists caught in the U.S. as enemy combatants, with no right to a criminal trial or to remain silent or to counsel during questioning, particularly if they are U.S. citizens.

The brief contains some candid admissions we haven’t heard from Holder since he took office: “It may be true that in some instances the government will not be able to obtain information from citizens who are informed of their right to counsel, or that obtaining that information may be delayed.” The authors do cite an academic study purporting to show that two-thirds of suspects provide incriminating information after being read their rights -- but this suggests, of course, that one-third did not. Maybe that’s okay for criminals, but the prospect of one out of three suspected terrorists not cooperating is far from reassuring.

Whatever the numbers are, the brief leaves no doubt that Holder views the loss of intelligence information as sometimes an acceptable tradeoff because, to quote from the brief again, “as a Nation we have chosen to place some limits on Executive authority in order to protect individual authority.” Pre-Obama Holder well appreciated that under some circumstances, treating terrorists like criminal defendants may be less protective of national security than treating them like enemies of the United States. But he was willing to take the risk to reduce what he perceived as possible abuses of power by the executive branch.

The most illuminating statement on this point comes a bit later in the brief:

[We] recognize that these limitations might impede the investigation of a terrorist offense in some circumstances. It is conceivable that, in some hypothetical situation, despite the array of powers described above, the government might be unable to detain a dangerous terrorist or to interrogate him or her effectively. But this is an inherent consequence of the limitation of Executive power. No doubt many other steps could be taken that would increase our security, and could enable us to prevent terrorist attacks that might otherwise occur. But our Nation has always been prepared to accept some risk as the price of guaranteeing that the Executive does not have arbitrary power to imprison citizens.”

The brief does not specifically quantify what level of risk the nation should be willing to accept. Perhaps it is 33 percent, reflecting the one-third of people who don’t cooperate after being Mirandized. Or maybe it’s something like the 20 percent of detainees released from Guantanamo who return to the fight, which, the president’s top counterterrorism adviser John Brennan said, “isn’t that bad” compared to the 50 percent recidivism rate of criminals.

Strangely, Holder apparently failed to disclose his involvement in this brief when he was up for confirmation early last year, even though the Senate questionnaire he was required to fill out specifically requested such information and directed him to provide to the Senate Judiciary Committee copies of any briefs filed with the Supreme Court. He disclosed three amicus briefs but made no mention of this one -- or another one renewing his support for Padilla when the case returned to the Supreme Court again in late 2005. (The 2005 brief is much like the 2004 brief, except the language on acceptable risks is absent.) Had Holder disclosed these briefs to the Senate Judiciary Committee, no doubt he would have been extensively questioned about the views expressed in them. It is disappointing, and perhaps troubling, that he did not.

BIGGER QUESTIONS
The briefs help to explain a great deal about Holder’s approach to KSM and Abdulmutallab, and detainee policy more broadly. The briefs provide insight into why Holder has refused to acknowledge that Abdulmutallab could have been lawfully detained as an enemy combatant. Holder has insisted for weeks that there is substantial legal doubt on this score because Abdulmutallab was caught in the U.S., not in a recognized battle zone. His position ignores the court-of-appeals ruling in the Padilla case, which held that a U.S. citizen captured on U.S. soil may be detained as an enemy combatant. That decision is still good law -- but Holder appears to discount it; after all, he supported Padilla. He prefers the earlier ruling of a different court of appeals, which sided with Padilla, even though that ruling was vacated by the Supreme Court.

This may also partly explain the administration’s handling of a case that was pending before the Supreme Court when Obama took office. That case involved Ali al-Marri, a non-citizen arrested in the U.S. and held as an enemy combatant. The court of appeals found there was an insufficient factual basis to support holding al-Marri as an enemy combatant, but on the far more consequential question of whether someone captured in the U.S. could be lawfully detained as an enemy combatant at all, the court ruled in the affirmative by a 5-4 vote, again contrary to the position Holder had taken in the Padilla case.

Now that he was attorney general, Holder was well placed to reverse course. One way to do this would have been to abandon the Bush administration’s arguments and side with al-Marri. But there would have been serious obstacles to surmount, not the least of which were the objections of the many career Justice, Defense, and other officials who had supported the Bush administration’s position. Perhaps even the White House would have objected, wishing to avoid the fallout of publicly siding with al-Marri.

So the path of least resistance was to avoid the whole issue, transfer al-Marri to the criminal system, and end the appeal before the Supreme Court could weigh in. This is the course the Obama administration chose. When the Bush administration did much the same with Padilla shortly after obtaining a favorable ruling, there were protests from many quarters that the administration was gaming the system to prevent review by the Supreme Court. The press’s reaction to the Obama administration’s move was muted and, if anything, congratulatory.

(In al-Marri, the Justice Department asked the Supreme Court to vacate the court-of-appeals decision as moot, and the Court granted the request. But this did not negate the similar court-of-appeals decision in the Padilla case -- which the Supreme Court had never vacated, even though the Bush administration had requested that it do so. So the president’s power to detain suspected terrorists captured in the U.S. as enemy combatants remains on the books.)

No one knows how the Supreme Court would have ruled in the al-Marri or Padilla cases. But had it upheld the court-of-appeals decisions, there would have been no way for Holder to claim any “uncertainty” about the authority to hold terrorists captured in the U.S. as enemy combatants. It’s one thing to ignore, as Holder has, a court-of-appeals decision you disagree with or ask the Supreme Court to vacate another you do not care for. It’s quite another to ignore a Supreme Court decision. Holder knows this and perhaps saw little upside to rolling the dice when he could simply declare the matter to be unsettled and go his own way.

Holder has a right to his opinion, but as the nation’s top law-enforcement officer, he does not have a right to ignore the law because of his personal views. Holder’s letters to Congress and public statements about Abdulmutallab mimic his losing briefs. They are so close in their legal arguments, examples, and points of emphasis that it would be unsurprising to learn that the briefs served as templates for the letters and statements. There is one very notable exception, however. Now that Holder is attorney general, he no longer acknowledges the risks to national security of treating terrorists as criminals. Holder could never admit that now, of course.

We also have a better understanding of why the Obama administration rushed to Mirandize Abdulmutallab after just 50 minutes of questioning, and why it so badly misread the country’s appetite for trying KSM in civilian court in New York. On the first, it is hardly surprising that no one gave serious thought to designating Abdulmutallab as an enemy combatant, since the administration’s two most senior national-security lawyers -- the attorney general and the intelligence community’s top lawyer, both of whom are political appointees -- had signed onto briefs as private lawyers arguing there was no such authority. No matter that they lost the argument in the federal courts.

On KSM, they saw a civilian trial as a showcase for the criminal-justice system as the best venue for trying foreign terrorists captured overseas on the battlefield. Never mind that Congress had created the military-commission system specifically to try these non-citizen suspected terrorists. Forget about the massive disruption, cost, and possible security threat to downtown Manhattan. Cast aside doubts about evidentiary issues and the pre-trial prejudice of the attorney general and the White House’s guaranteeing the conviction and execution of KSM. The KSM trial was their shot at vindicating a deeply held faith in the civilian system, while allowing the disfavored military system to wither away.

GUANTANAMO LAWYERS AT JUSTICE
Before hysterics accuse us of “McCarthyism” for pointing out that Holder and others in the current administration filed briefs in the Padilla case, we want to make clear there is nothing wrong, in our view, with the Justice Department’s hiring lawyers who formerly represented Guantanamo detainees or now-convicted terrorists such as Padilla or al-Marri. Nor do we have an objection to those attorneys working on detainee-related issues at Justice, assuming they abide by their recusal obligations to avoid conflicts of interest. Their patriotism is also not in question.

We do find the outrage over “outing” these lawyers somewhat peculiar, however. There have been countless award ceremonies, press releases, and other highly public announcements celebrating Guantanamo lawyers by name. There is even a recently published book detailing the work of dozens of Guantanamo lawyers in the most laudatory terms.

And, in any event, in most cases, court filings are a matter of public record. This is how we learned of Holder’s involvement in the Padilla case. As far as we know, the media similarly learned the names of the lawyers from purely public sources. None of this is secret, and the suggestion the lawyers’ privacy has been invaded is ridiculous. That’s why Holder’s decision to withhold most of the names from Congress served no readily apparent purpose.

Holder’s failure to disclose to Congress his participation in the Padilla case is even more curious. Did he forget? Did he think it wasn’t important enough to mention? Was there some concern it could hurt him at confirmation? Was he worried about being associated with Padilla (who was eventually convicted of terrorism charges in civilian court)?

We do not know. But we imagine the senators on the Judiciary Committee would have preferred to have the opportunity to question Holder about the ideas he set out in his Padilla briefs before they were put into action, and just how much tolerance for risk to our national security he might have.

-- Bill Burck is a former federal prosecutor and deputy counsel to Pres. George W. Bush. Dana Perino is former press secretary to President Bush.

EDITOR’S NOTE: When contacted by National Review Online regarding this story, the Department of Justice declined comment.

SacBee -- Opinion

2010-03-10 08:00:00 GMT

Workers assemble Toyota trucks at the NUMMI plant in Fremont in 2004.

Bee should ease up on Toyota

Re " Toyota, stay loyal to Golden State" (Editorial, March 5): Building and selling automobiles is an expensive and risky proposition. In California, with the level of regulation our esteemed lawmakers deem appropriate and most manufacturers find stifling, the only way cars could be produced here was with the cooperation of two huge organizations. So, GM gets bailed out and bugs out on the NUMMI auto plant in Fremont, leaving Toyota to carry the weight – and Toyota gets nailed by The Bee editorial board for wanting to shut down a money-losing proposition?

Personally, I don't care where my car is built, as long as it's built well. It's time for The Bee's editorial folks to take their respective lances and search out some other – reasonable – windmills at which to tilt.

– Phil Perry, Sacramento

Lobbyists regulated enough

Re "Lobbyists ply their trade on home front" (Editorial, Feb. 24): It is unreasonable for The Bee editorial board to suggest that lobbyists live in cloisters. Many of us are actively involved in our communities and may have pre-existing personal relationships with public officials.

The editorial board is endorsing further regulatory control over what we do as private citizens in own homes. The Fair Political Practices Commission has already struck a well-thought-out balance between our constitutional rights and the reporting obligations of the Fair Political Practices Act.

When lobbyists open their homes to public officials, lobbyists are in turn prohibited from claiming any reimbursement of expenses associated with the meal and are further prohibited from claiming any tax deduction. Clearly, the FPPC sought to ensure that home entertainment be for private purposes and not in the furtherance of any business interest.

– Jackson R. Gualco

president, Institute of Governmental Advocates,

Sacramento

Government doesn't create jobs

Re "Green jobs: Finding the right tools to grow California's economy" (Forum column, Feb. 28): It's amazing to hear that someone actually thinks that having a government mandate to produce something (energy) more expensively than it is currently being produced will somehow create jobs.

Jobs are created by entrepreneurs, people who discover new ways of doing things, people who uncover demand for a product or service.

Jobs are not created by the government or by people with ideas like those of environmental writer Peter Asmus.

The government can prop up an industry or company, but it will always be at someone else's expense.

– David Buehler, El Dorado Hills

Health care is a right

To those with pre-existing medical conditions and exorbitant health insurance premiums, here's my modest proposal.

Since Congress is locked in a futile debate while we slip further and further behind, send your health care bills to Washington and let them pay the sums that insurance doesn't cover. Maybe the CEO of Blue Cross, who makes about $9 million a year, can chip in. I'm sure they can also cover the postage.

Just as we accept that government takes charge of large infrastructure projects, why can't we get our minds around government leading the way in health care? Health care is a social infrastructure. It should be a right, not a privilege.

– Sarah Wersan, Folsom

Call to police deserves award

Re "Girl's odd behavior led woman to call police" (Our Region, March 5) Hooray for Lincoln hair salon manager Elizabeth Rios.

I wish there were more people like her. It seems like so many things are going on that could be stopped if more people would either call authorities or organizations that could help. Rios should get an award for heroism, in my book.

– J. M. Huff, Yuba City

Oversight panel has vital role

Re "Oversight unit misses the mark" (Column, March 8): We are surprised that Bee columnist Dan Walters finds trivial the scrutiny of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's furlough policy, which affects roughly 200,000 workers, the performance of nearly every state agency, more than a billion dollars of the state general fund and every Californian who uses state services for anything from an unemployment check to a driver's license.

In four reports, the Senate Office of Oversight and Outcomes quantified some of the unintended costs of furloughing most of the state work force three days a month – an unprecedented policy that deserves assessment because it may be used again by future leaders.

The office was created by Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg to bolster Senate scrutiny of government operations. We have examined the In-Home Supportive Services program and problems with the reporting of elder abuse. Now we're assessing the effect of telephone deregulation on consumers and gaps in the screening of caretakers for the elderly and disabled – work we consider important to California taxpayers, even if it is not what Mr. Walters would have us pursue.

– John Adkisson

special counsel,

Senate Office of Oversight and Outcomes

Sacramento

Deregulation led to this mess

Re "Some legislative medicine" (Letters, March 1): When Assemblyman Roger Niello writes, "… most of our problems with health care have to do with too much government rule-making …" he offers the same mentality that is at the root of the problem.

He wants government to back away from health care regulations even more, and suggests that we should just trust the insurance corporations. He, like most contemporary corporate apologists, seems not to recognize that Enron, WorldCom, Arthur Andersen, AIG, banks large and small, and the second-worst economy in U.S. history were the direct result of loosened regulations.

– Steven Brody, Elk Grove

Can't afford to cut money-saver

Re "It worked – teen births are falling" (Editorial, March 3): We should be proud of California's declining teen birth rates that buck national trends.

The good news about California's successful family planning program is also the result of federal support. The federal government pays California $9 for every $1 our state budget invests in contraception, STD treatment and cancer screenings. Since its inception, Family PACT has saved California more than $2 billion in medical and social services costs through the prevention of unintended pregnancies.

It is estimated that California saves $5.33 for every $1 we spend on contraception to prevent unplanned pregnancies.

Indeed, our progress is in jeopardy with the governor's proposal to cut $28.7 million from this program should federal support lag. We cannot afford to cut a program that prevents nearly 300,000 unintended pregnancies a year and saves taxpayer money on future costs.

– Genevieve Shiroma

board member,

Planned Parenthood Sacramento

Denise Richardson

Denise Richardson — 2010-03-10 15:51:14 GMT

When I heard the news that the Federal Trade Commission was going to begin regulating the way identity theft prevention is advertised, my mind flashed on all the deceptive advertising about free-but-not-so-free credit reports and I was hopeful. I actually...

PORTLAND NEWS - Google News

2010-03-11 01:21:41 GMT

Trader Joe's mulls opening store in Portland, Ore.
BusinessWeek
The company has applied to the federal government to purchase the former Wild Oats Market store on Marginal Way. The Federal Trade Commission is seeking ...
Trader Joe's Eyes Former Wild Oats Site in PortlandMPBN News
FTC Seeks Public Comments on Trustee's Proposal for Sale of Portland, Maine ...Trading Markets (press release)

all 12 news articles »

Boston.com -- Latest news

2010-03-10 18:08:14 GMT

Grocery chain Trader Joe's is considering coming to Portland. The company has applied to the federal government to purchase the former Wild Oats Market store on Marginal Way. The Federal Trade Commission is seeking comment on the proposal.

Ars Technica

jacqui@arstechnica.com (Jacqui Cheng) — 2010-03-10 19:37:00 GMT

Identity theft prevention service LifeLock is not as pristine as its reputation claims after all. The company agreed to pay out $12 million to settle charges with the Federal Trade Commission and 35 states, which had said that LifeLock's identity-theft-prevention claims were false and that the company actually made its own customer data available and unsecured from theft. As it turns out, there is no way to fully guarantee that identity theft won't happen, no matter what someone puts on the side of a truck.

LifeLock has made a name for itself as the go-to service if you never want to have any part of your identity stolen, ever. The company claims to proactively protect your information against fraud, alert you to any kind of shady activity, and reduce credit card offers for $10-15 per month. Those who have seen LifeLock's trucks driving around their cities know that the company used to slap its CEO Todd Jones' social security number on the side of the vehicle along with a number of claims guaranteeing that its customers won't fall victim. (As an aside, Jones' identity allegedly ended up getting stolen in 2007.)

Read the comments on this post

News for WSLS 10

2010-03-10 15:49:37 GMT

The states and the Federal Trade Commission brought false advertising claims against Lifelock Inc

Patent Law Blog (Patently-O)

Dennis Crouch — 2010-03-10 15:32:00 GMT

Ajinomoto Co., Inc. v. International Trade Commission (Fed. Cir. 2010) The ITC held that Ajinomoto's patents were invalid for failure to satisfy the best mode requirement of 35 U.S.C. 112. On appeal, the Federal Circuit affirmed. The two asserted patents...

SacBee -- Letters to the Editor

2010-03-10 08:00:00 GMT

Workers assemble Toyota trucks at the NUMMI plant in Fremont in 2004.

Bee should ease up on Toyota

– Phil Perry, Sacramento

Lobbyists regulated enough

– Jackson R. Gualco

president, Institute of Governmental Advocates,

Sacramento

Government doesn't create jobs

Jobs are created by entrepreneurs, people who discover new ways of doing things, people who uncover demand for a product or service.

Jobs are not created by the government or by people with ideas like those of environmental writer Peter Asmus.

The government can prop up an industry or company, but it will always be at someone else's expense.

– David Buehler, El Dorado Hills

Health care is a right

To those with pre-existing medical conditions and exorbitant health insurance premiums, here's my modest proposal.

– Sarah Wersan, Folsom

Call to police deserves award

Re "Girl's odd behavior led woman to call police" (Our Region, March 5) Hooray for Lincoln hair salon manager Elizabeth Rios.

– J. M. Huff, Yuba City

Oversight panel has vital role

– John Adkisson

special counsel,

Senate Office of Oversight and Outcomes

Sacramento

Deregulation led to this mess

– Steven Brody, Elk Grove

Can't afford to cut money-saver

Re "It worked – teen births are falling" (Editorial, March 3): We should be proud of California's declining teen birth rates that buck national trends.

It is estimated that California saves $5.33 for every $1 we spend on contraception to prevent unplanned pregnancies.

– Genevieve Shiroma

board member,

Planned Parenthood Sacramento

pfblogs.org: The Ad-Free Personal Finance Blogs Aggregator

CreditBloggers — 2010-03-10 15:45:42 GMT

"Scare tactics," "over-promised benefits," "deceptive advertising," "didn't deliver," "vulnerable to attacks," "false claims . . . ." These are the terms used by the Federal Trade Commission to describe LifeLock's marketing campaigns and its service. And in an article published by IDG News Service, Lisa Madigan, Illinois' Attorney General, cautions consumers, "Don't be scared into spending your hard-earned money. . . . This is the typical tactic of a scam artist." As a result, LifeLock will be paying $12 million to settle a lawsuit brought by the FTC and the attorneys general of 35 states. Settlements such as this generally are agreed to when the defendant (a) doesn't believe it can win in court and/or (b) wants to control its downside financial risk and avoid spending potentially millions more defending a major lawsuit while being distracted from normal business operations. Still, according to a legal expert, $12 million is a lot to settle a deceptive advertising case. This means that LifeLock and its co-defendants, company founder Robert J. Maynard, Jr., and CEO Todd Davis, could have spent more if they chose to defend the lawsuit, go to trial, and possibly lose.   Some of the issues the FTC had with LifeLock were ...

GigaOM

Mathew Ingram — 2010-03-10 13:41:30 GMT

Google's chief economist Hal Varian told the Federal Trade Commission in a presentation on the future of journalism that newspapers have been in decline since before the Internet, and that one of the ways they can improve their web operations is to engage

Team Cymru Internet Security News

2010-03-10 04:10:00 GMT

"An Arizona company that sells services designed to prevent identity theft has agreed to pay $12m to settle charges it oversold their effectiveness and didn't adequately protect sensitive customer data. LifeLock, which since 2006 has run TV and print ads displaying the social security number of its CEO, agreed to stop misrepresenting its service as a foolproof way to prevent identity theft, according to the US Federal Trade Commission. The consumer watchdog agency and attorneys general from 35 states claimed the company's $10-per-month service failed to stop the most prevalent forms of the crimes...."

Team Cymru Internet Security News

2010-03-10 04:17:00 GMT

"LifeLock, Inc. has agreed to pay $11 million to the Federal Trade Commission and $1 million to a group of 35 state attorneys general to settle charges that the company used false claims to promote its identity theft protection services, which it widely advertised by displaying the CEO s Social Security number on the side of a truck. In one of the largest FTC-state coordinated settlements on record, LifeLock and its principals will be barred from making deceptive claims and required to take more stringent measures to safeguard the personal information they collect from customers...."

Posts from the Econsultancy blog

Patricio Robles — 2010-03-10 09:10:27 GMT

Social networks are increasingly popular with marketers, and that means they're increasingly popular with the government bodies that regulate marketers.

In the United States, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has issued guidelines designed to set boundaries on what marketers can and can't do in the world of social media. So it's no surprise that a similar effort is now taking shape across the pond in the UK.

A proposed amendment to the Committee of Advertising Practice (CAP) Code would give the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) the ability to scrutinize activity that takes place on social networking websites. According to the Advertising Association, which submitted the proposed amendment:

The recommendations, if accepted, will bring companies’ marketing communications on their own websites, and other non-paid for space online, such as brand activity on social networking sites, within scope of the CAP Code.

Currently, paid online advertising, such as search and display ads, fall within the ASA's remit. But the ASA says that's not enough:

...nearly two thirds of the complaints that we receive about online marketing activity are not presently covered by the Code. The proposed extension of our remit will plug this regulatory gap, ensuring that consumers enjoy the same level of protection on websites as they do in paid-for space.

Needless to say, this move is not surprising given the amount of marketing activity that takes place outside of the areas the ASA has the authority to regulate. And it's not entirely surprising that industry is supporting it. As we've seen in the United States, where much was made of the FTC guidelines when they were first announced, the threat of this kind of regulation usually turns out to be exaggerated. The vast majority of businesses aren't trying to break the rules, and with some official guidelines in place, some marketers may feel more comfortable about their activities in nascent mediums like social media. If expanding the ASA's remit helps foster more comfort amongst marketers who are interested in social media investments, the expansion could be a good thing.

Unfortunately, it's unclear how many of the complaints not covered by the CAP Code would be actionable even after the remit is expanded. After all, legitimate businesses aren't behind most of the egregious online scams that ensnare online consumers. Scammers don't care about the rules, and for consumers, the ASA's ability to regulate won't be nearly as important as its capacity to enforce.

Photo credit: davidsonscott15 via Flickr.

Search for "lifestyle"

2010-03-10 14:40:49 GMT

As part of the Federal Trade Commission's ongoing hearings into the future of journalism, Google's chief economist Hal Varian gave a presentation on newspapers and their financial problems that is well worth taking some time to read .

Today's Tribune-Review

2010-03-10 08:00:00 GMT

LifeLock Inc., a provider of identity theft protection, agreed to pay $12 million to settle claims by the Federal Trade Commission and 35 states that the company exaggerated the value of its services.

Media: PDA | guardian.co.uk

Mercedes Bunz — 2010-03-10 12:01:26 GMT

Charging might work with specialist content, says Google's chief economist – but engaging readers with online content during their leisure hours is a more promising strategy

The key to most newspapers' survival online is engaging more with readers, rather than seeking to charge them directly, Google argues.

The case was put by its chief economist, Hal Varian, yesterday at a workshop of the Federal Trade Commission in Washington on "The Future of Journalism".

Google denies any responsibility for the problems newspapers face. "The news industry's financial problems started well before the web came along," Varian said in his speech, which he also published as a blogpost.

Google estimates that charging for access is only a solution for news organisations with specialised content, since competition for generic news is too high.

A more promising approach, Varian argues, is to increase the involvement of readers with news during leisure hours, when they have more time to look at content and advertisements. Google recently introduced several experiments in displaying news differently, such as Fast Flip and the open source project Living Stories.

According to Google, declining print circulation hadn't been offset online because news readers tend to look at a disproportionate amount of online content during working hours, when people have little spare time. "The average amount of time looking at online news is about 70 seconds a day, while the average amount of time spent reading the physical newspaper is about 25 minutes a day," Varian says.

Furthermore, analysing search clicks, Google finds that the traditional cross-subsidization model of newspapers is broken. While before, in print, advertisements in special interest sections such as motoring, travel, or home & garden helped finance the general news production, now most of the search clicks are in categories such as sports, news and current events, and local.

According to Google, which doesn't display any advertising with its overview page Google News, there is money to be made in the sectors of travel, health, shopping and computers and electronics while news is hard to monetize, despite being frequently accessed.

In general, Google's outlook for newspapers isn't too good. "The transition to a fully online news will be difficult, but there's a good chance that we will emerge with a significantly more compelling user experience," Varian says.

Newspapers don't exploit fully the information they have and use their analysis and statistic tools, Google argues. A more direct measure of what users seek and read such as reviews, video and local news would improve online news, as would better advertisement measurement and a more intense contextual targeting.

Google, which wants the world to know that it is "keen on working with the news industry", sees some hope in new devices – such as the iPad – that could make online reading more attractive in leisure hours.

Therefore, Google's strong advice for newspapers is to increase user engagement, summed up clearly in one of Varian's bullet points: "Engagement is currently low, need to increase it".

Mercedes Bunz

guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

ProPublica: Articles and Investigations

2010-03-10 14:04:49 GMT

by Chisun Lee, ProPublica -

The Supreme Court recently freed corporations to spend more money on aggressive election ads. But if businesses take advantage of this new freedom, the public probably won't know it, because it's easy for them to legally hide their political spending.

Under current disclosure laws for federal elections, it's virtually impossible for the public to track how much a business spends, what it's spending on, or who ultimately benefits. Experts say the transparency problem extends to state and local races as well.

"There is no good way to gauge" how much any given company spends on elections, said Karl Sandstrom, a former vice chairman of the Federal Election Commission and counsel to the Center for Political Accountability. "There's no central collection of the information, no monitoring."

Companies invest in politics to win favorable regulations or block those "that could choke off their business model," said Robert Kelner, chairman of Covington & Burling's Washington, D.C., political law group. But they'd rather hide these political activities, he said, because they fear backlash from customers or shareholders.

For instance, a company may want to help Democratic politicians who support healthcare reforms that would benefit the company, but it worries about offending "Republican shareholders who may care more about their personal ideology than about their three shares of stock in the company," said Kelner, who says he represents many politically active Fortune 500 companies. "The same would be true on the other side of the political spectrum."

Businesses must reveal their identities on public reports to the Federal Election Commission if they buy advertising on their own. But one popular and perfectly legal conduit for companies wanting to influence politics under the radar is to give money to nonprofit trade groups such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

The Chamber and its national affiliates spent $144.5 million last year on advertising, lobbying and grassroots activism -- more than either the Republican or Democratic party spent, according to a Center for Responsive Politics analysis of public records -- while legally concealing the names of its funders. The Los Angeles Times reported this week that the Chamber is building a grass-roots political operation that has signed up about 6 million non-Chamber members.

Some of the positions the Chamber has successfully advanced on behalf of its donors include a nationwide campaign to unseat state judges who were considered tough on corporate defendants and opposition to a federal bill that would have criminalized defective auto manufacturing.

Now the Jan. 21 Supreme Court ruling that increases the potential political clout of businesses is drawing fresh attention to the problem of tracking them.

That decision (PDF), Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, allows corporations to run television ads that don't merely speak to an issue but say outright whether a candidate should be elected, and allows them to do so any time they want to, using their general funds. The ruling also gives nonprofit groups like the Chamber these new freedoms, because they are technically structured as corporations.

Before, corporations had to rely on employee and shareholder contributions to a separate political account to finance the most explicit commercials and, in the months before an election, any issue ads that mentioned a candidate. Although the decision addressed federal election rules, its constitutional rationale also dismantles similar restrictions in 24 states.

Soon after the ruling, two Democrats -- Maryland’' Rep. Chris Van Hollen and Sen. Charles E. Schumer of New York -- announced they were writing a bill to make it easier to tell which companies are backing which ads in federal elections. An outline (PDF) of that bill, which is expected to be introduced this week, proposes forcing nonprofit groups to identify those who fund their political commercials.

At present, nonprofit groups don't have to disclose the sources of their advertising money, unless the donors specified that their contributions were intended for political ads.

"Unless you're sort of dumb enough to designate your contribution to the Chamber," said Meredith McGehee, policy director of Campaign Legal Center, "no one will ever know who's the source of those funds."

Politically active nonprofits exist across the ideological and policy spectrum and include unions as well as trade groups. Their funders include both corporations and individuals, some of them very wealthy. But campaign finance experts say groups that advocate specifically for business tend to have the greatest resources, simply because corporations have the most money to give.

The lack of tracking mechanisms sometimes leaves company officials themselves in the dark about their organization's political activities, said Adam Kanzer, managing director and general counsel of Domini Social Investments, which files shareholder resolutions to push corporations to adopt self-monitoring and disclosure practices.

"In a lot of our conversations with companies, they say, 'We don't know exactly how our money is getting spent. It's hard to get those answers,'" Kanzer said. One major drug manufacturer, he said, signed on for voluntary disclosure after learning that its funds had supported a state judicial campaign that many voters -- who could be customers or shareholders -- viewed as racist.

The public price of spotty disclosure is not being able to gauge the real effects of corporation-backed politics, McGehee said. She questioned one argument, often made by defenders of the Citizens United decision, that the 26 states that have long allowed unlimited corporate advertising in their elections haven't suffered more political corruption than the rest of the nation.

"How would you know? Most of those states have next to no disclosure," McGehee said. Corporations "could be buying outcomes left and right, but because of no disclosure, we don't know." A 2007 examination by the National Institute on Money in State Politics found that, while 39 states required some degree of disclosure by political advertisers, the laws in most were riddled with loopholes. Only five states required enough detail to link sponsors with specific ads, the report said.

Rep. Van Hollen said the disclosure requirements he and Schumer are drafting would uncover the corporate political money flowing through nonprofit channels.

"If corporations spend money in these campaigns, we cannot allow them to hide behind sham organizations and dummy corporations that mislead voters," he said in a written comment to ProPublica. "Voters have a right to know who is delivering and paying for the message."

The requirements would apply to unions and liberal nonprofits as well trade groups, according to the early outline of the bill. The proposal mentions additional transparency requirements -- such as mandating corporate disclosures to shareholders and "stand by your ad" appearances by CEOs of companies that finance commercials directly -- and seeks outright bans on political advertising by government contractors, bailout recipients and companies significantly controlled by foreigners.

A strong disclosure law would be "hugely effective" in revealing who is paying for political speech, said Trevor Potter, a former FEC chairman and head lawyer for John McCain's presidential campaigns, who is now general counsel at Campaign Legal Center.

But precisely for that reason, Potter said, politics may get in the way of any serious reform. He expects trade groups on the right, unions on the left and other cause groups across the board to fight hard against such legislation.

Already the political battle is taking shape.

Asked to comment on the push for more disclosure, the Chamber's chief legal officer and general counsel, Steven Law, instead attacked the political motives of the proponents. "Unions overwhelmingly support those who are pushing this legislation," he said in an e-mail. "This isn't about reform, it's about politicians trying to secure advantages for themselves before an election."

That reaction drew fire from one of the nation's most politically active unions, the Service Employees International Union, which also declined to comment on the new disclosure proposals. "The coming flood of corporate and foreign money into our elections through the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is a threat to democracy, plain and simple," said Anna Burger, SEIU's secretary-treasurer, in an e-mail. She called on legislators to "drag the Chamber's practices into the light of day."

The Chamber revealed more about its view of disclosure in an amicus brief (PDF) it filed in the Citizens United case on behalf of the 3 million business members it says it has. It supported the plaintiff, a nonprofit corporation called Citizens United, which wanted the Supreme Court not only to lift corporate advertising bans but also to strike down the existing disclosure requirements.

The Chamber argued that those requirements inhibited corporations from speaking out. If the public discovered that corporations were "taking controversial positions," it might punish them, the brief said. As an example, it pointed to a 2005 boycott of ExxonMobil products after the public learned the company was lobbying Congress to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to drilling.

That argument failed to persuade the high court, which by an 8-1 majority decided to leave the current disclosure laws intact.

Transparency is important, wrote Justice Anthony Kennedy for the majority, because it helps voters "give proper weight to different speakers and messages," and because it allows citizens to "see whether elected officials are 'in the pocket' of so-called moneyed interests."

Starbulletin Headlines

Gregg K. Kakesako — 2010-03-09 22:20:58 GMT

The Federal Trade Commission announced yesterday that LifeLock, an identity theft protection company, agreed to pay $11 million to settle claims with its customers and $1 million to 35 states, including Hawaii.

Boston Globe -- Business

Associated Press — 2010-03-10 03:50:47 GMT

NEW YORK - LifeLock Inc., an identity theft protection company that backed its guarantees by putting its chief executive’s Social Security number on the side of its trucks, will pay $12 million to settle claims it misrepresented its services, according to the Federal Trade Commission.

Boston Globe -- Today's paper A to Z

Associated Press — 2010-03-10 03:50:47 GMT

Washington Examiner Site Feed

2010-03-09 20:45:13 GMT

An Arizona company that promised to protect consumers from identity theft has agreed to pay $12 million to settle false advertising claims brought by the Federal Trade Commission and 35 states.

Tech Blog

Joseph Menn — 2010-03-10 00:25:11 GMT

The US Federal Trade Commission said on Tuesday that heavily promoted identity theft prevention company LifeLock agreed to pay it and 35 states $12m to settle their accusations that it deceived consumers with a bogus $1m “guarantee” that it would stop fraud in their names. The FTC’s legal complaint is the latest in a series of [...]

The Seattle Times

2010-03-09 21:28:09 GMT

LifeLock Inc. - an identity theft protection company that backed its guarantees by putting its CEO's social security number on the side of its trucks - will pay $12 million to settle claims it misrepresented its services, according to the Federal Trade Commission.

The Seattle Times

2010-03-09 19:37:24 GMT

An Arizona company that promised to protect consumers from identity theft has agreed to pay $12 million to settle false advertising claims brought by the Federal Trade Commission and 35 states.

GOOGLE NEWS - Google Blog Search

Google Public Policy Blog — 2010-03-09 14:00:00 GMT

The Federal Trade Commission is exploring questions like this through a series of workshops on the future of the news industry. At the first round in December, Josh Cohen from the Google News team spoke about how we're working with news ...

msnbc.com: Security

2010-03-09 23:53:42 GMT

LifeLock spent millions spreading its CEO’s Social Security Number all across America. Now the firm will spend $12 million settling claims that it engaged in deceptive advertising and failed to protect customers' personal information.

LifeLock - Social Security Number - Federal Trade Commission - Advertising - United States

azfamily

2010-03-09 22:07:43 GMT

PHOENIX (AP) — An Arizona company that promised to protect consumers from identity theft has agreed to pay $12 million to settle false advertising claims brought by the Federal Trade Commission and 35 states.

Wired: Politics

Kim Zetter — 2010-03-09 20:34:00 GMT

The Federal Trade Commission is alleging Arizona-based Lifelock engaged in false advertising by promising customers that if they signed up with its service their personal information would become useless to identity thieves. The FTC fined it $12 million as part of a settlement agreement.

Gothamist

Ben Muessig — 2010-03-09 16:52:00 GMT

New Yorkers are some of the least likely people in the country to fall victim to scams. Though local con artists continue to try to pull off the "broken glasses scam," the "broken bottle scam," and the "I need an insulin shot scam," New York City wasn't one of the top 50 places nationwide where residents have complained of scams or identity theft.

A Federal Trade Commission study reveals that con men scammed more than 1.3 million Americans, forcing consumers to pay a reported $1.7 billion in false charges. While New Yorkers fared well, residents of Mount Vernon-Anacotes—a Washington State region with 116,000 inhabitants—were found to be the country's easiest marks, according to the Daily News. "New Yorkers are smarter and more cynical than most; that's the only explanation I can give you," said Leonard Gordon, a regional FTC commissioner. "And we don't know why Mount Vernon-Anacotes was No. 1."

Researchers say some of the most common scams involve fake prizes, sweepstakes and lotteries where victims "pay an entry and get nothing in return." Also common are work-at-home or fee-for-employment hustles. "They say, 'Send us $100 or $200 and we'll get you a job.' Or 'Send us money for this at-home employment' and of course there's no job," said Gordon.

News after Newspapers

newsafternewspapers@gmail.com (Martin Langeveld) — 2010-03-09 18:10:00 GMT

Google’s economist-in-chief, Hal Varian, was the keynote speaker this morning at the Federal Trade Commission’s second round of hearings on the future of journalism. (The study is entitled “How will journalism survive the internet age?” Round 1 was held in December; transcripts and other material are linked here — scroll down. Not to be outdone, the Federal Communications Commission also has a project studying pretty much the same thing.

Here’s the slide deck from Varian’s presentation, entitled “Newspaper Economics, Online and Offline”:

Click through to slide deck and full post at Harvard's Nieman Journalism Lab.

YubaNet.com

2010-03-09 16:59:35 GMT

Attorney General Edmund G. Brown Jr. today joined the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and 34 other attorneys general to announce a settlement against LifeLock, Inc. that prevents the company from "misrepresenting and overstating" the identity theft protection services it offers to consumers.

Google Public Policy Blog

Google Public Policy Blog (noreply@blogger.com) — 2010-03-09 09:00:00 GMT

Posted by Hal Varian, Chief Economist

It is widely recognized that the news industry is facing financial difficulties, but there is little agreement about the source of those difficulties or what can be done about them. The debate about the role of the web has been particularly heated: is it the source of the problem or the source of the solution? The Federal Trade Commission is exploring questions like this through a series of workshops on the future of the news industry. At the first round in December, Josh Cohen from the Google News team spoke about how we're working with news publishers to help them attract bigger audiences and generate more revenue. The next round of the workshop kicks off in Washington D.C. this morning, and I will be speaking about the economics of news -- offline and online. I first gave this talk at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism in January and wanted to give you a summary of my remarks here.

The news industry's financial problems started well before the web came along. Circulation has been falling since 1985 and circulation per household has been falling since 1947! Ad revenue for newspapers was roughly constant in real terms up until 2005, and ad revenue per reader actually increased up until that time. Since then, the drop in advertising rates due to the recession, coupled with a significant drop in circulation, has exacerbated newspapers' financial difficulties.

In the last five years many more people have been reading the news online: About 40% of internet users say they looked at online news “yesterday.” Higher income households report even larger numbers, making online news readers a potentially attractive audience for advertisers.

However, visitors to online newspaper sites don't spend a lot of time there. The average amount of time looking at online news is about 70 seconds a day, while the average amount of time spent reading the physical newspaper is about 25 minutes a day. Not surprisingly, advertisers are willing to pay more for their share of readers' attention during that 25 minutes of offline reading than during the 70 seconds of online reading. So even though online advertising has grown rapidly in the last five years, it appears that somewhat less than 5% of newspapers' ad revenue comes from their internet editions, according to the most recent Newspaper Association of America data.

There's a reason for the relatively short time readers spend on online news: a disproportionate amount of online new reading occurs during working hours. The good news is that newspapers can now reach readers at work, which was difficult prior to the internet. The bad news is that readers don’t have a lot of time to devote to news when they are supposed to be working. Online news reading is predominately a labor time activity while offline news reading is primarily a leisure time activity. One of the big challenges facing the news industry is increasing involvement with the news during leisure hours, when readers have more time to look at both news content and ads.

What about search engines? Many readers go directly to their favorite news site, but a good fraction use search engines to access news specific news topics. According to comScore, clicks from search engines account for 35-40% of traffic to major U.S. news sites. Since most newspaper ads are priced on a per-impression basis, this means that 35-40% of major U.S. newspaper online revenue is coming from search engine referrals. That is a big fraction of online advertising revenue but, as we saw above, online ad revenue is only about 5% of the total.

Furthermore, the real money in search engine advertising is in the highly commercial verticals like Shopping, Health, and Travel. Unfortunately, most of the search clicks that go to newspapers are in categories like Sports, News & Current Events, and Local, which don’t attract the biggest spending advertisers.

This isn't so surprising: the fact of the matter is that newspapers have never made much money from news. They’ve made money from the special interest sections on topics such as Automotive, Travel, Home & Garden, Food & Drink, and so on. These sections attract contextually targeted advertising, which is much more effective than non-targeted advertising. After all, someone reading the Automotive section is likely to be more interested in cars than the average consumer, so advertisers will pay a premium to reach those consumers.

Traditionally, the ad revenue from these special sections has been used to cross-subsidize the core news production. Nowadays internet users go directly to websites like Edmunds, Orbitz, Epicurious, and Amazon to look for products and services in specialized areas. Not surprisingly, advertisers follow those eyeballs, which makes the traditional cross-subsidization model that newspapers have used far more difficult.

Some have argued that the solution to the financial problems of newspapers is to charge for access. Many people place a high value on news, and there is clearly a significant social value to having a well informed citizenry. The problem is that there is a lot of competition among news providers, and this competition tends to push prices down. News sources that have highly differentiated content may be able to make pay-for-access work, but this will likely to be difficult for more generic news sources.

In my view, the best thing that newspapers can do now is experiement, experiment, experiment. There are huge cost savings associated with online news. Roughly 50% of the cost of producing a physical newspaper is in printing and distribution, with only about 15% of total costs being editorial. Newspapers could save a lot of money if the primary access to news was via the internet.

New tablet computers like the Kindle, iPad, and Android devices may encourage people to read online news at home in the comfort of their easy chairs. At Google, we certainly don't think we have all the solutions, but we are definitely keen on working with the news industry to help it attract bigger audiences and generate more ad revenue. Experiments like Fast Flip, Living Stories and Starred Stories may help pull together the at-work and at-home access to the news. Online news access on handheld device like cell phones and tablets is likely to be quite different from traditional newspapers reading, with much more multimedia content, interactivity and reader involvement. The transition to a fully online news will be difficult, but there's a good chance that we will emerge with a significantly more compelling user experience.

pfblogs.org: The Ad-Free Personal Finance Blogs Aggregator

CreditBloggers — 2010-03-09 14:10:00 GMT

During National Consumer Protection Week, a good part of the focus is on helping consumers protect themselves from scams, fraud and rip-offs. To illustrate some of the issues consumers are struggling with, The Federal Trade Commission recently released its list of top complaints received in 2009: Rank Category /Number of Complaints 1 Identity Theft / 278,078 2 Third Party and Creditor Debt Collection / 119,5493 Internet Services / 83,0674 Shop-at-Home and Catalog Sales / 74,5815 Foreign Money Offers and Counterfeit Check Scams / 61,736 6 Internet Auction / 57,821 7 Credit Cards / 45,2038 Prizes, Sweepstakes and Lotteries / 41,763 9 Advance-Fee Loans and Credit Protection/Repair / 41,448 10 Banks and Lenders / 32,44311 Credit Bureaus, Information Furnishers and Report Users / 31,62912 Television and Electronic Media / 26,56813 Health Care / 25,414 14 Business Opportunities, Employment Agencies and Work-at-Home Plans / 22,896 15 Computer Equipment and Software / 22,621 I always find these lists interesting, because they are made up of consumers who actually took the time to file a complaint with the FTC. How many other people were ripped off, or had problems, but suffered in silence? Later this week, I'll detail one of the scams on this ...

pfblogs.org: The Ad-Free Personal Finance Blogs Aggregator

The Smarter Wallet — 2010-03-09 07:01:29 GMT

As insurance costs become more and more expensive, people are cutting corners in order to feel protected without paying the high price for coverage. Those who have already been diagnosed with medical conditions are especially susceptible to making costly mistakes when it comes to medical coverage. These costly mistakes occur when consumers see advertisements for so-called discount health plans that promise affordable health care with no deductibles or co-pays. These plans also promote heavy discounts on care and pharmacy bills. Image from sfgate.com Discount Health Plans: The Real Story Those of you who are drawn in to signing up for these discount health plans are many times under the illusion that they are actually buying health insurance. However, the discount health plans which are also known as medical discount plans are NOT insurance. In their own right, the plans may have some use because of the discounts they do offer, but it’s also a good thing that the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is stepping in to alert consumers about the differences. Consumers need to be aware of the fine line between what they think they’re getting and what they are actually getting. What Are the Differences? There are two general ...

SPYWARE NEWS - Google News

2010-03-09 14:17:24 GMT

Federal Trade Commission statistics show New Yorkers among least likely to be ...
New York Daily News
"In the end, I found spyware and viruses on my computer that enabled the thief to get my debit card information. I do a lot of online shopping," he told the ...

Patent Docs

Patent Docs — 2010-03-09 05:55:00 GMT

By Kevin E. Noonan -- Policy arguments based solely on outcome rather than process are rarely effective when put into practice. This is because the desired benefits of the outcome blind the policymaker to the question of whether the desired outcome can be achieved without considering the effects (intended or otherwise) by the process. This effect can be seen, for example, in the Federal Trade Commission's crusade to ban "reverse payment"-containing settlements of ANDA litigation. The desired outcome is cheaper drug prices as soon as possible. However, against the "per se" illegal stance of the FTC, several regional Courts of...

CNN iReport - Latest

MediaBlitz — 2010-03-09 03:06:35 GMT

The FTC is mailing out 5,700 checks in the mail,if you receive one of them,MAKE SURE you go cash it,since they are only valid for 60 days.

http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2010/03/roex.shtm

For Release: 03/04/2010

FTC to Distribute $3 Million in Refunds to Consumers Who Bought Bogus Health Products

The Federal Trade Commission will distribute more than 5,700 refund checks totaling approximately $3 million to consumers who bought infrared saunas and dietary supplements from Roex, Inc., based on bogus claims that the products would treat, prevent, or cure a wide range of serious diseases.

The amounts of the refund checks were determined by the amount consumers spent on these products, with the average check totaling about $500. These are legitimate checks, and the FTC urges consumers to cash them. The checks will be mailed on March 5, 2010.

The refunds stem from a March 2009 FTC complaint charging Roex, Inc. and two individuals with making false or unsubstantiated advertising claims. The marketers claimed that their infrared sauna could treat cancer, and that their supplements could treat, reduce the risk of, or prevent various health conditions including cancer, HIV/AIDS, diabetes, strokes, heart attacks, Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, arthritis, multiple sclerosis and other autoimmune diseases, ulcers, herpes, asthma, and glaucoma.

The products were sold on the company’s Web site and in print materials, but the marketers’ main advertising vehicle was a nationally broadcast, live, hour-long, call-in radio program titled “The Truth About Nutrition.” The resulting settlement and court order required the defendants to pay $3 million to redress consumers.

The Roex refund checks are valid for 60 days from the date they are issued. A special phone line has been set up to handle questions about the refunds. Consumers should call 1-877-571-8672 for further information.

For more information about the case, see the court documents and news release regarding the settlement at http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2009/03/roex.shtm.

The Federal Trade Commission works for consumers to prevent fraudulent, deceptive, and unfair business practices and to provide information to help spot, stop, and avoid them. To file a complaint in English or Spanish, visit the FTC’s online Complaint Assistant or call 1-877-FTC-HELP (1-877-382-4357). The FTC enters complaints into Consumer Sentinel, a secure, online database available to more than 1,700 civil and criminal law enforcement agencies in the U.S. and abroad. The FTC’s Web site provides free information on a variety of consumer topics.

MEDIA CONTACT:: Betsy Lordan
Office of Public Affairs
202-326-3707
STAFF CONTACT:: Elizabeth K. Nach
Bureau of Consumer Protection
202-326-2611

(Roex refunds NR.wpd)
(FTC File No. 072-3076)

Software Law Made Simple

Jeremy Aber — 2010-03-08 20:41:00 GMT

I have been tracking this issue for a while, but I wanted to wait until I had a concise and insightful perspective before I blogged about it. So here goes.

In essence, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) published these guidelines to address what some creative advertisers were doing with blogging and in the social media arena (Facebook, Twitter, etc) (i.e. paying bloggers to endorse their product without the bloggers actually believing in the product or maybe without even using it). The FTC is really focused on the product advertisers, and not bloggers or users, unless the blogger is a sponsored endorser (i.e. receiving something ($, product, etc.) in return for promoting the product). [By the way, the FTC has even stated that they drafted these guidelines not with the intention to sue bloggers, more here -- I thought that was a nice touch]

A definition will help.

An endorser is someone that publishes an:

“…advertising message those consumers are likely to believe reflects the opinion, belief, finding or experience…” of the publisher, but is not the product advertiser.

It is obviously relevant if the person is:

(1) providing an independent review [i.e. off the hook], or

(2) somehow compensated by the advertiser (directly or indirectly).

Examples of sponsored endorsers: paid bloggers, or bloggers that receives many free products.

If there is a sponsored endorser, then the advertiser and the sponsored endorser could have liability for:

(1) false/misleading statements or unsubstantiated statements, and

(2) failure to disclose the connection or any compensation.

One important point here is that the advertiser should require the sponsored endorser to disclose the connection to the advertiser and only publish substantiated claims. The advertiser should also monitor the blogger, as they could still be liable for their unsubstantiated or false claims.

There is a lot more to these guidelines, and I have tried to summarize them here in business terms (not lawyer speak), so talk to your attorney before taking any action under these new guidelines. If you want to read a lot more about it, then go to the source.

Another way to look at this issue, is with a simple Decision Tree:

(1) Is the message an endorsement?

(2) If yes, then:

(a) is it an independent review, or

(b) is there some form of compensation from the product advertiser.

(3) If (b) is yes, then the blogger must disclose the connection to the product advertiser, not make any false claims, and substantiate any representations(the product advertiser should require the blogger to disclose the connection and not make any unsubstantiated or misleading claims).

Of course everyone knows that all messaging should be based on honest beliefs, findings or experiences (that really goes without saying).

As a software licensing attorney, I really think that this is something software and IT based companies should consider as part of their content marketing strategy.

Some more general information is here: link

[By the way, I have not discussed the celebrity endorsement rules or the new rules on whether results are typical or not, as that is for another day and another post]

Multifamily and Mixed Use Development

Womble Carlyle Team (noreply@blogger.com) — 2010-03-08 13:43:00 GMT

In February 2010, the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) entered into a settlement with First Advantage SafeRent, Inc. (“SafeRent”) stemming from allegations that SafeRent violated the Fair Credit Reporting Act (“FCRA”) by failing to provide renters with proper access to their files. SafeRent compiles reports for landlords on prospective tenants, which include eviction history, lease and payment information, and the results of criminal background checks.

Under FCRA, SafeRent is required to make certain information available to consumers and to enable them to dispute and correct that information in a timely manner. SafeRent, however, refused to accept consumers’ faxed requests for files or to update information. Instead, upon receipt of a faxed request, SafeRent allegedly rejected the faxed requests and directed the consumer to mail in a new request, thus imposing delay into the record process, and potentially preventing consumers from obtaining their desired rental property.

The FTC alleged that SafeRent’s practices violated FCRA and constituted an unfair and deceptive trade practice under the FTC Act. SafeRent settled the dispute with the FTC, agreeing to pay a $100,000 civil penalty. Under the settlement, SafeRent also is required to disclose the contents of a tenant’s file upon the consumer's request and to investigate all reports when the tenant disputes their accuracy.

The FTC’s recent action demonstrates its continued enforcement of consumer protection requirements. Companies subject to FCRA should examine their practices for updating consumer information, and ensure that such practices enable consumers to obtain information and correct misinformation in a timely manner.

To view a printer friendly version of this client alert, click here.

Contact Information

If you have any questions regarding these issues, please contact Jennifer Kashatus at (202) 857-4506 or email, or Pamela Rothenberg at (202) 857-4422 or email, or any of our Privacy or Multifamily Real Estate attorneys.

WalletPop Blog

Nick Farina — 2010-03-08 18:30:00 GMT

Filed under: Money College, Identity Theft

Meet my friend Brian, whose name I've changed to protect his identity. If only he had the same safeguards in place around the time he applied for his first credit card.

Brian was 19, and his parents thought it would be a good idea for him to start building his credit history. As Brian and his parents discussed his application with the banker, they were both surprised to learn that he already had a credit card -- five, in fact. They were also surprised to learn that he never paid his bills and had an affinity for expensive jewelry.

Brian, of course, was a victim of identity theft. Several years later, and despite professional help, he still hasn't managed to clear his name. He's not alone. Identity theft remains a huge problem, with the Federal Trade Commission recording more than 273,000 complaints about it in 2009.

Continue reading Money in English: The perils of young adult identity theft

Money in English: The perils of young adult identity theft originally appeared on WalletPop Blog on Mon, 08 Mar 2010 13:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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News

Caralyn Davis — 2010-03-08 18:07:17 GMT

Competition is all but a fading memory in many U.S. health insurance markets, allowing many insurers both to employ aggressive pricing strategies and to cut existing customers to boost profit margins, so says a new Goldman Sachs research report backed up by a recent American Medical Association (AMA) study.

The Obama administration is using this news to push for health reform. Today, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius followed up last week's White House meeting with insurance industry leaders by issuing a letter asking the CEOs of UnitedHealth Group Inc., WellPoint Inc., Aetna Inc., Health Care Service Corp. and Cigna HealthCare Inc. to provide public, detailed justifications for proposed health insurance premium increases.

Sebelius issued the latest letter in the wake of the research brief from New York investment bank Goldman Sachs. The brief gave a buy recommendation for both UnitedHealth and CIGNA because price competition is down over the past year and insurers are focused on improving profit margins, even if it means losing customers.

The Goldman Sachs analysis is supported by the 2010 AMA study, "Competition in Health Insurance: A Comprehensive Study of U.S. Markets," which is based on 2009 data. In an analysis of 313 metropolitan areas, the AMA found that 99 percent have "highly concentrated" insurance markets under guidelines used by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). (By comparison, the AMA's 2009 study ranked 94 percent of metropolitan areas as highly concentrated.)

Only three metropolitan areas--Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Fla., and Colorado Springs, Colo.--failed to meet the criteria for highly concentrated markets, being deemed "moderately concentrated." However, moderately concentrated doesn't mean competitive. Both highly and moderately concentrated rankings would give the DOJ and the FTC pause about approving a same-market merger or acquisition.

Increasingly, states are under the stranglehold of a single insurer. One insurer enjoyed a market share of 70 percent or more in 24 of 43 states measured, up from 18 in 42 states in the 2009 study. In 92 percent of the 313 metropolitan areas, one insurer held at least a 30 percent share, said the AMA.

To learn more:
- read the HHS press release
- check out the New York Times article
- here's the American Medical News article

Ars Technica

nate@arstechnica.com (Nate Anderson) — 2010-03-08 17:35:00 GMT

Rep. Eric Massa (D-NY) resigns from Congress this evening at 5pm, which is good news to ISPs that serve more than two million customers apiece.

In the wake of last year's monthly data cap trials by Time Warner Cable, Massa announced publicly that he would introduce a bill that would limit such caps, and he did so in June 2009.

The "Broadband Internet Fairness Act" was simple; it would make it illegal for "major broadband Internet service providers to offer volume usage service plans imposing rates, terms, and conditions that are unjust, unreasonable, or unreasonably discriminatory." ISPs of more than two million subscribers would need to file a "service plan analysis" with the federal government any time they proposed or altered "volume usage service plans." The Federal Trade Commission would then weigh in on these plans, which would need to justify the "economic reasonableness and necessity for imposing such tiers."

The bill has been stuck in committee since then and does not appear to have any traction; Massa's decision to resign from Congress will probably put an end to it.

As for why a freshman Congressman like Massa is resigning at all... it's an odd story. Massa said that it was due to health concerns, but it soon emerged that he was also the subject on an ethics complaint from a male staffer. On his radio show this weekend (Roll Call listened so you don't have to), Massa gave his version of the story, which took place at a holiday party late last year. After dancing with a bridesmaid, Massa returned to a table of his staffers—all apparently single men.

One of them looked at me and as they would do after, I don’t know, 15 gin and tonics, and goodness only knows how many bottles of champagne, a staff member made an intonation to me that maybe I should be chasing after the bridesmaid and his points were clear and his words were far more colorful than that. And I grabbed the staff member sitting next to me and said, 'Well, what I really ought to be doing is fracking you.' And then [I] tousled the guy’s hair and left, went to my room, because I knew the party was getting to a point where it wasn't right for me to be there. Now was that inappropriate of me? Absolutely. Am I guilty? Yes.

Massa now faces a Congressional ethics complaint over the incident, though he says he was unaware of this until after his health issues resurfaced.

The result is that New Yorkers lose a representative willing to say things like this: "Cable providers want to stifle the Internet so they can rake in advertiser dollars by keeping consumers from watching video on the Internet. But so long as Americans can't choose which cable channels they want to pay for, I don't think cable operators should be able to determine consumers' monthly Internet usage. Additionally, charging based on a bandwidth usage is a flawed model when the cost of usage is totally out of line with the price. Consumers are much better served by plans based on the speed of the connection rather than amount of bandwidth used. Competition is crucial to our economy and I refuse to let monopolistic corporations dominate the market and gouge my constituents."

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NYConvergence - A digest of New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut digital media technology news

NYConvergence — 2010-03-08 16:50:16 GMT

Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY) is calling on the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to put an end to "cramming" phone charges, "charges made to consumers' and small' businesses phone bills that they did not order," in response to reports that New...