Being Catfished by your Online Dating Website Company?

Online dating and social media websites have given us an up-to-date way to meet other people for potential romantic relationships and/or friendships.  This new-age way of meeting people has also brought about the term known as “catfish”, which is defined as when one person lures another person into a relationship by means of a fictional online persona.  It is bad enough when an individual catfishes another person, but it becomes even more insulting when an online dating service company uses the same fictional practices to trick online daters into signing up for paid memberships to their dating websites. 

Because of the recent catfish activities by certain online dating companies, the Federal Trade Commission has recently filed a law enforcement action against JDI Dating, Ltd.  This online dating company would post fake profiles on many of their 18 online dating websites for new users to view and then would send to the new users’ phony messages from these bogus profiles in hopes to entice them into upgrading their membership to a paid member in order to be able to read those messages.  Then to add insult to injury, JDI Dating would deliberately fail to inform their subscribers that such subscriptions would automatically renew and would continue to renew until the subscribers cancelled the membership.  JDI Dating and their websites would also intentionally bury the strict requirements of the cancellation amongst pages and pages of terms in hopes to confuse and make it virtual impossible for subscribers to terminate their membership.

Online dating websites have become a very standard way to meet up with people in hopes of finding love or other types of connections.  However, the use of deceptive practices for financial gain by playing on matters of the heart is unconscionable.  With new laws being enacted, such as the Restore Online Shoppers’ Confidence Act (ROSCA) to better protect the public from such dishonest methods, individuals that have been violated in such a manner may have the right to pursue legal remedies.  If you find yourself in this type of situation, or even a similar situation, you may have certain protections for such online actions against you, and the attorneys at Traverse Legal can assist with these and other types of online issues.