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September 25, 2019 11:30 pm
Original Link: http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/WZJyvn6zoAc/matchcom-connected-daters-to-fake-accounts-to-boost-subscriptions-us-regulators-say
Match.com Connected Daters To Fake Accounts To Boost Subscriptions, US Regulators Say
The FTC has filed a lawsuit against Match Group alleging that the company connected Match.com daters with fake accounts in an effort to get them to subscribe. "The case hints at the murky line between genuinely helpful notifications and those that prey on people's curiosity to monetize a service," reports The Verge. From the report: Non-paying Match.com users cannot view or respond to messages they receive on the service, but whenever they receive one, Match.com emails them to let them know, encouraging them to subscribe to see the message. The FTC claims that, in hundreds of thousands of instances, Match.com notified daters of messages even after the company detected that the account sending the message was fraudulent. Once these people subscribed, they opened the message to see that the user had already been banned or, days later, would be banned for on-platform fraud, the lawsuit says. When these users then complained to Match.com or tried to get their money back, Match.com denied any wrongdoing. The FTC claims this behavior led to 499,691 new subscriptions, all traced back to fraudulent communications, between June 2016 and May 2018. The lawsuit also claims that these automatically generated email alerts were often withheld from paying subscribers until Match.com completed a fraud review. It still allegedly automatically sent the advertisement email to non-paying users, however. The FTC also claims that Match.com made canceling subscriptions incredibly difficult -- canceling requires over six clicks, according to the complaint. Match.com also allegedly locked people out of their accounts after they disputed charges, even if they lost their dispute and had time remaining in their subscription. The FTC is seeking monetary relief for consumers who lost money from the company's practices.Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Original Link: http://rss.slashdot.org/~r/Slashdot/slashdot/~3/WZJyvn6zoAc/matchcom-connected-daters-to-fake-accounts-to-boost-subscriptions-us-regulators-say
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