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post-transaction

Visa targets online marketing 'scam'

Visa, one of the world's largest credit card companies, is taking aim at "scam" marketing practices that were quietly used by some of the Internet's largest retailers in recent years.

Retailers will no longer be able to allow third parties to charge a customer's card without the card owner re-entering credit card information, Visa said Tuesday. This is Visa's response to one of the biggest scandals to rock online retailing in years.

Last year, the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation launched an investigation after learning that thousands of consumers had … Read more

Classmates.com tied to more dubious marketing tactics

Social-networking site, Classmates.com is once again accused of misleading consumers.

At a time when Classmates.com and parent company United Online are already mixed up in a congressional investigation, Classmates.com is attempting to settle a lawsuit that accuses the company of sending e-mails that duped users into believing the messages had come from old high school chums.

E-mail recipients only learned the truth after paying for upgrades to their membership, according to court documents. In a court filing, Classmates.com has agreed to pay $9.5 million to settle the suit but did not admit any wrongdoing. The … Read more

New York examines Web marketing 'scam'

New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has launched an investigation into the marketing practices of 22 online retailers, including Staples, 1-800-Flowers.com, and Orbitz.

Cuomo's office said Wednesday it issued subpoenas to the merchants and requested information about the retailers' relationships with three marketing companies, Webloyalty, Affinion, and Vertrue. These firms have allegedly misled consumers for years into joining membership programs and paying monthly fees.

Webloyalty and the other companies are so-called post-transaction marketers that have compiled a long history of consumer complaints and class-action lawsuits. Typically, the three firms present pop-up ads to online shoppers when they're … Read more