Reuters Money

The Federal Trade Commission announced a series of lawsuits on Tuesday aiming to shut down marketers who use ads pretending to be from real news organizations aimed at giving legitimacy to sham acai berry diet products.

“Almost everything about these sites is fake,” David Vladeck, Director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection, said announcing the crackdown. “The weight loss results, the so-called investigations, the reporters, the consumer testimonials, and the attempt to portray an objective, journalistic endeavor.”

The ads often will have an array of logos of legitimate news organizations or sometimes a made-up TV news station with a model’s image as the reporter.

Another tactic in the ads was the pretense that users would click on headlines that made them look as though they were investigations into the products. An example from the FTC: “Acai Berry EXPOSED – Health Reporter Discovers the Shocking Truth.”

Consumers clicked over to the phony sites from these ads millions of times, the FTC said. Those who decided to purchase the products after reading stories that ended up concluding they really worked spent $70 to $100 apiece, the FTC said — a total of $10 million lost.

The agency said it had amassed numerous complaints from consumers who said they were duped into buying the weight loss products by the phony stories and accompanying testimonials that also turned out to be fake.

Charles Harwood, deputy director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection, said the purported news stories and the comments that ran below them were identical from site to site, right down to the typos. And the claims the supposed reporters had verified — no matter which fake reporter it was — were always the same: 25 pounds lost in four weeks, he said.

“We allege this is pure fabrication,” Harwood said at a news conference. “The weight loss results reported on these sites are impossible to achieve.”

The FTC filed 10 lawsuits in six different federal courts and announced that the Illinois Attorney General’s office had filed a similar action in state court there. Half the cases already have resulted in temporary restraining orders. The FTC is seeking to permanently bar the companies from using the phony ads to market the products and from claiming that they are proven to work. In addition, the agency is asking the court to freeze the companies’ assets to try to recoup some money for those who were allegedly ripped off.

The following companies were named in the FTC lawsuits:

Beony International LLC; Ambervine Marketing LLC, and Encastle Inc.; Intermark Communications, Inc. also doing business as Copeac, and IMM Interactive; TL Advertising; Circa Direct LLC; Coulomb Media, Inc.; DLXM, LLC; Lead Expose, Inc., and Uptown Media, Inc.

Several individuals were also named in the lawsuits.

The FTC, in conjunction with the announcement, released a new warning to consumers about this type of deceptive advertising as well as a new video about the danger of trial offers.