How many of you are captivated by ads guaranteeing dazzling white teeth? Well, beware. Apparently, many have been deceived by ads posted by tooth whitening companies on major U.S. sites such as Google and Yahoo which promise a free trial for tooth-whitening products when in fact registering enrolls pretty smile seekers to an expensive subscription that is difficult to cancel.
The consumer protection division of Utah filed an action in September against Farend. In addition the Better Business Bureau initiated an investigation last month looking into the advertising practices of various tooth whitening brands. The CEO of one company, Dazzlesmile, states that Epic, its marketing agency, created the deceptive advertising without the company's knowledge and that relationship has since been severed, however Epic continued to run the ads for Farend's dazzlesmilepro.com web site. Epic, of course, denies the allegations, but is now facing a trademark-infringement cease-and-desist letter from Dazzlesmile.
Yahoo and Microsoft both declined to comment on the specific case but said they are committed to protecting consumers. It will be interesting to see how this shakes out considering ISPs are not held responsible for content posted on their sites. Does this apply to advertising? Shouldn't they have some editorial responsibility for what they are paid to post? I suppose that could get extremely complicated.
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Friday, November 27, 2009
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