{"id":2730,"date":"2014-04-08T23:18:24","date_gmt":"2014-04-08T23:18:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ncjolt.org\/?p=2730"},"modified":"2020-06-04T20:53:43","modified_gmt":"2020-06-04T20:53:43","slug":"stop-being-a-jerk-ftc-charges-jerk-com-with-deceiving-consumers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/blogs\/stop-being-a-jerk-ftc-charges-jerk-com-with-deceiving-consumers\/","title":{"rendered":"Stop Being a Jerk: FTC Charges Jerk.com with Deceiving Consumers"},"content":{"rendered":"

On Monday, April 7, 2014, the FTC alleged<\/a> that Jerk broke federal laws and deceived consumers. The Massachusetts-based company created the social media site, Jerk.com which was active from 2009 until 2013. It also operated under jerk.be and jerk.org. The current jerk.com<\/a> seems to have nothing to do with the original site. Also included, as a defendant in the FTC\u2019s case is Jerk\u2019s operator, and Napster co-founder, John Fanning<\/a>. The FTC alleged that Jerk.com improperly accessed personal information from Facebook and charged dead-end fees, all while preying on consumers\u2019 fear of having their reputations tarnished online.<\/p>\n

The FTC alleged that Jerk.com improperly accessed personal information from Facebook and charged dead-end fees, all while preying on consumers\u2019 fear of having their reputations tarnished online.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Director of the FTC\u2019s Bureau of Consumer Protection, Jessica Rich, stated<\/a>, \u201cIn today\u2019s interconnected world, people are especially concerned about their reputation online, and this deceptive scheme was a brazen attempt to exploit those concerns.\u201d On the other hand, Jerk stated<\/a> that consumers could \u201cuse Jerk to manage your reputation and resolve disputes with people you are in conflict with.\u201d
\nThe first allegation is that Jerk.com took most of the information for its 63.4 to 81.6 million profiles directly from Facebook, instead of being user-generated, as it claimed<\/a>. Many of the pictures featured on Jerk\u2019s profiles were designated as private on Facebook. It is estimated<\/a> that 2.7 to 6.8 million of the photos featured children that appeared to be under the age of ten. There were photos of children being bathed and a mother breast-feeding her baby. The profiles, besides including photos, also featured personal information, the designation of jerk or not a jerk, and allowed other users to post comments about the profile\u2019s subject.
\nSecondly, Jerk.com is alleged<\/a> to have exploited consumers\u2019 desire for clean online reputations for financial gain. Several consumers complained that simple Internet searches of their names would pull up their Jerk.com profiles, calling them a jerk. Jerk would charge $25 to e-mail a customer service representative, who would then suggest that the subject pay $30 for a subscription fee.\u00a0 Subscribers could access premium content such as being able to change their jerk profile.\u00a0 However, in most cases, the consumer got nothing in return for these payments, and the profiles were rarely altered.
\nIn 2012, Facebook sent Jerk a cease and desist letter, which Jerk largely ignored. Instead, Jerk blamed<\/a> Facebook for inadequate privacy policies: \u201cWe are equally horrified to discover that Facebook is placing personal information from its users including name and photographs in the public domain without requiring any agreement to its terms of service where anyone can acquire it.\u201d Last year, Jerk filed a motion<\/a> in an attempt to dismiss the FTC\u2019s case. In it, they claimed the government investigation was nothing more than a fishing expedition. They claimed<\/a> that their total revenue in 2012 was only about $3,000, that they had only 22 subscribers, and that they removed profiles of anyone 14 and under, once notified.
\nThe FTC voted, 4-0 to issue the administrative complaint<\/a>, and the hearings will begin on January 27, 2015, before an administrative judge in the FTC.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On Monday, April 7, 2014, the FTC alleged that Jerk broke federal laws and deceived consumers. The Massachusetts-based company created the social media site, Jerk.com which was active from 2009 until 2013. It also operated under jerk.be and jerk.org. The current jerk.com seems to have nothing to do with the original site. Also included, as …<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[51],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2730"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2730"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2730\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7470,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2730\/revisions\/7470"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2730"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2730"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2730"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}