Showing posts filed under: FTC Beat by Steven Eichorn
2018: The End of Cryptocurrencies?
Cryptocurrencies (e.g. Bitcoin) took the broader public by storm in 2017 and had a breakout year. There were outsized and even unprecedented returns, along with extreme volatility and even more extreme volatility. The question for 2018 is whether cryptocurrencies had their “fifteen minutes of fame” or they are here to stay? Blockchain technology (which is… Read More
The Risks of Cryptocurrency and How the Government Will Protect Consumers
Bitcoin and a host of cryptocurrencies have taken both Wall Street and Main Street by storm in 2017. The nearly continuous gains in the price of Bitcoin have spawned numerous imitators and led a number of companies to raise critical start-up funds by selling their own token/cryptocurrency in a process similar to an initial public… Read More
Deadline Fast Approaches for Final DMCA Registration
The Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) provides a safe harbor from copyright infringement liability for online service providers. While not a particularly famous law, it is a critical law because it enables websites to accommodate user-generated content without being concerned for copyright infringement claims by hosting that content. However, in order to preserve their safe… Read More
ICOs: Proceed with Caution
Today, the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) issued an investor bulletin and an investigative report. The investigative report found that companies involved in sales of digital assets via distributed ledger or blockchain technology may be engaged in conduct subject to federal securities laws. While this report is the first of its kind to address initial… Read More
Amazon Pursued Fake Reviews In 2015, What Will It Pursue In 2016?
In 2015, Amazon filed suit against over 1,000 unnamed individuals for allegedly offering to sell fake online reviews (positive or negative) on Fiverr.com (“Fiverr”). The unnamed defendants offer to provide 5-star reviews and some defendants even encourage sellers to provide their own text to use in the review. In order to avoid detection, defendants… Read More
How to Break the Federal Debt-Collection Law — By Texting
It’s quite clear that the Federal Trade Commission and the Federal Communications Commission view existing federal consumer protection and communications statutes as fully applicable to new modes of communication such as texting. One excellent recent example is the FTC’s stipulated settlement, including a payment of $1 million, with a debt collection agency that had sent… Read More
FTC: Data Brokers That Compile Tenant Data May Be Covered by FCRA
On April 3, 2013, the Federal Trade Commission issued a press release that marks yet another step in its continuing trend of actions involving data brokers and data providers. As we have noted in earlier blog posts, the agency is making a concerted effort on a number of fronts to enforce the laws that protect… Read More
Cybersecurity a Desirable Goal, but Does Obama Proposal Go Too Far?
In the past couple of years, a wide variety of computer viruses and other malware have allegedly been used by one nation against another. This secretive form of warfare even briefly plastered names like Stuxnet, Duqu, Flame, and Gauss across the front pages. In partial response to the threat posed to U.S. interests by hostile… Read More
Should FTC Protect Gamers Against Unhappy Endings?
Whether you or not you are an avid gamer, you have probably realized that a significant segment of the general population takes gaming quite seriously. Probably a little too seriously sometimes. It seems that the ending to the popular game Mass Effect 3 (“ME3”), which is produced by BioWare, disappointed many devoted players so much… Read More
FTC Obtains Injunction, Asset Freeze on Alleged Mortgage Scam
The Federal Trade Commission has obtained an order from the federal court for the Central District of California for a preliminary injunction and asset freeze against all the defendants in an alleged mortgage modification scam. The complaint was filed against California-based Sameer Lakhany and a number of related corporate entities for violating the Federal Trade… Read More
IFRAH Law
