Fake News Sites Settle FTC Charges for $13 Million

This has been a long running case, as the federal courts temporarily halted the Beony operation and nine others in 2011 pursuant to an injunction granted at the Commission’s request. In each of these cases, the FTC alleged that the marketing websites were designed to appear as if they were part of legitimate news organizations, but were actually nothing more than advertisements deceptively enticing consumers to buy acai berry weight-loss products featured in the “news reports.” With titles such as “News 6 News Alerts,” “Health News Health Alerts,” or “Health 5 Beat Health News,” the sites often falsely represented that the reports they carried had been seen on major media outlets such as ABC, Fox News, CBS, CNN, USA Today, and Consumer Reports. Investigative-sounding headlines presented stories that purported to document a reporters’ first-hand experiences with acai berry supplements – typically claiming to have lost 25 pounds in four weeks, according to the FTC complaints. This month Federal Trade Commission put a permanent halt to yet another online fake news scheme, concluding a 10-case sweep that collectively yielded more than $9.4 in settlement charges. The FTC announcement of the two proposed settlements is part of their ongoing crackdown on bogus health claims made by nutraceutical site owners and marketers.