Promises of 'Passive Income' On Amazon Led To Death Threats For Negative Online Review, FTC Says

"The Federal Trade Commission is cracking down on 'automation' companies that launch and manage online businesses on behalf of customers in exchange for an upfront investment," reports CNBC's Annie Palmer. "The latest case targets Ascend Ecom, which ran an e-commerce money-making scheme, primarily on Amazon." The FTC accuses the e-commerce company of defrauding consumers of at least $25 million through false claims, deceptive marketing practices, and attempts to suppress negative reviews. From the report: Jamaal Sanford received a disturbing email in May of last year. The message, whose sender claimed to be part of a "Russian shadow team," contained Sanford's home address, social security number and his daughter's college. It came with a very specific threat. The sender said Sanford, who lives in Springfield, Missouri, would only only be safe if he removed a negative online review. "Do not play tough guy," the email said. "You have nothing to gain by keeping the reviews and EVERYTHING to lose by not cooperating."

Months earlier, Sanford had left a scathing review for an e-commerce "automation" company called Ascend Ecom on the rating site Trustpilot. Ascend's purported business was the launching and managing of Amazon storefronts on behalf of clients, who would pay money for the service and the promise of earning thousands of dollars in "passive income." Sanford had invested $35,000 in such a scheme. He never recouped the money and is now in debt, according to a Federal Trade Commission lawsuit unsealed on Friday. His experience is a key piece of the FTC's suit, which accuses Ascend of breaking federal laws by making false claims related to earnings and business performance, and threatening or penalizing customers for posting honest reviews, among other violations. The FTC is seeking monetary relief for Ascend customers and to prevent Ascend from doing business permanently.

So will Amazon be found to be an accessory?

[Rosco P. Coltrane]

Yeah, I didn't think so...

Re:So will Amazon be found to be an accessory?

[Entrope]

Do you even know what the criteria to be considered an accessory to a crime are? The criteria are not "Rosco P. Coltrane doesn't like them".

The fraud victims bought into get-rich-quick schemes that violated Amazon's policies, and Amazon often closed their seller accounts for doing so. Unless a prosecutor can show that Amazon both had knowledge of this fraud and took some action to assist the fraud, Amazon cannot be held responsible as an accessory to the fraud.

Re:

[2TecTom]

but is Amazon really doing enough to vet these companies? Amazon is profiting from this so there is some liability somewhere. Of course, IANAL

Re:

[Entrope]

IANAL either, but a helpful first lesson for you: profit != liability.

Re:

[2TecTom]

IANAL either, but a helpful first lesson for you: profit != liability.

It doesn't really matter if transnational corporations obey the laws or not since they're so far above 'our laws and can so easily just rewrite them whenever necessary, now does it?

Re:

[Entrope]

If you want to argue that Amazon is breaking some specific law or laws then do so, but your feelz plus their profits do not constitute such an argument.

In this particular case, no one has (yet) argued that Amazon was an actual accessory to the fraud in this case. In particular, no one has offered evidence that Amazon had the requisite knowledge of this fraud. It's also not clear that Amazon acted, or refrained from acting, in a way that knowingly furthered the fraud.

Re:

[mjwx]

but is Amazon really doing enough to vet these companies? Amazon is profiting from this so there is some liability somewhere. Of course, IANAL

I agree that Amazon and others aren't doing enough... but that's not really a decision for the courts, rather that is the domain of law and policy makers and shouldn't be made retroactive.

If they're not doing enough to prevent fraud, then we need to lay out guidelines to inform companies of the minimum expectations they are legally required to meet, just as we do with banks... well I mean as most civilised countries do with banks.

Re:

[2TecTom]

We don't need more regulation, we need effective regulation.

Money is power, power corrupts.

Re:

[thegarbz]

Amazon is profiting from this so there is some liability somewhere. Of course, IANAL

Indeed you are not a lawyer. The act of getting a profit doesn't make you magically liable for a 3rd party's actions.

Re:

[DrXym]

Not for this but the amount of fake, dangerous and illegal goods sold through Amazon plus an assortment of other scams means they are complicit. They might feign ignorance, and claim to have procedures to report scams or claim refunds procedures buried in their UI somewhere. But the reality is they're happy to turn a blind eye and even happier to skim a % off sales, or the money in frozen accounts when the scammers are finally reported.

Re:

[Malay2bowman]

Even their (supposedly) legitimate "Amazon Basics" branded goods turned out to be dangerous and deadly a few years back https://www.theverge.com/2020/... [theverge.com] https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/10... [cnn.com] It still amazes me that a diverse range of products under one brand all had these serious defects pop up in such a short time period.

Red flag

[jools33]

I have noticed fairly often that in the stats - I can see that there have been a lot of 1 star and 2 star reviews, but mysteriously I cannot navigate to a single one of them; that for me is always a red flag to avoid the product.

Laughing at the CNBC article's irony...

[fleeped]

While talking about this story, in the trending pages on the side you find this other article: "36-year-old mom making $10,000 a month or more in passive income: My best side hustle advice"

Re:

[arglebargle_xiv]

While talking about this story, in the trending pages on the side you find this other article: "36-year-old mom making $10,000 a month or more in passive income: My best side hustle advice"

Passive all right, she just lay there and didn't even pretend to be taking part. At one point she started scrolling through Facebook posts.

How about FBI too?

[misnohmer]

I get FTC going after fraudulent business, but shouldn't FBI be going after the death threats?

Re:How about FBI too?

[RobinH]

Mod parent up. This is something I've never understood about the online space. Some woman posts her story of abuse online and she gets death threats. A trans person tells their story and gets death threats from some fringe religious people. Heck, a mom of a trans person shares her story and she gets death threats from some fringe people in the trans community. Death threats are blatantly illegal and the police need to stop looking the other way. It's a tactic that shuts down reasonable online discussion and makes the whole place unbearably toxic.

Re:

[Retired Chemist]

True, but how many police do you think are out there. There are probably thousands of such cases every day. Most law enforcement are working on crimes that have caused actual physical or financial harm, not just threats. In the case above it was undoubtedly the financial element that got the FTC involved rather than the threats themselves.

Re:

[hdyoung]

This. There are only so many cops, and they only have 8-12 hours per day to do things.

Meanwhile, several state spy agencies have embraced chaos as an art form coughRUSSIAcough, in addition to whatever 8chan edgelord groups consider themselves Xtreme (the capital X is important) and think swatting is fun. And it’s not that hard to write a bot that will occasionally email/dialup “insert group here” and make “insert fraudulent threat here”. Add an infinite loop, click run, wal

Re:

[RobinH]

Go after the social media companies that don't police it. We absolutely shouldn't be censoring political opinions online (which there's evidence that social media companies are actually doing) yet they should definitely stop death threats, and that seems like something AI could reliably detect, so they could automate the flagging.

Re:

[LazarusQLong]

I think the problem is finding the actual human who made the threat, coupled with them perhaps being in another jurisdiction/Country, so, then the FBI would need to locate the physical person, negotiate with the country in question, and perhaps making death threats in that country are not illegal?

I am 100% with you on Death Threats being illegal here in the USA but it seems no one takes them seriously until there is a dead body, or the person receiving those threats is a politician. It has been a pet pee

Re:How about FBI too?

[cayenne8]

Mod parent up. This is something I've never understood about the online space. Some woman posts her story of abuse online and she gets death threats. A trans person tells their story and gets death threats from some fringe religious people. Heck, a mom of a trans person shares her story and she gets death threats from some fringe people in the trans community. Death threats are blatantly illegal and the police need to stop looking the other way. It's a tactic that shuts down reasonable online discussion and makes the whole place unbearably toxic.

While the threats are horrible, illegal and should be prosecuted....

How about we NOT share every fucking detail of our lives online?

What happened to keeping most things private that are personal?

If you weren't shouting from the trees about the details of your life...no one that has something against your life would even know you existed.

I just don't get it....on YouTube they have aggregate videos of people pouring their hearts out on TikTok....women lamenting on and on how they're lonely, or other people being put down, etc...

WTF are you broadcasting your whole life and personal problems to the world? How does this "fix" anything in your life?

If you need to talk...get a real friend in meatspace or shy of that, find a shrink to talk to....

Again, no one should get a death threat....but seems common sense that if you don't broadcast your life to the world....you won't get threats.

There's ALWAYS going to be someone against any topic and unhinged enough to pounce....time to remember the "importance of not being seen" [youtube.com].

Re:

[RobinH]

I have no problem with people sharing their story, and I have no problem with people ridiculing them mercilessly for it (some of them are certainly ridiculous after all -- it makes good entertainment). But I find it abhorrent that someone would be able to threaten them with physical violence or death. That needs to be the line nobody crosses.

Remember?

[Ol Olsoc]

When making death threats was a crime onto itself? Now it is a normal part of life, and a tool for at least one quasi-political group.

and did they harm the family?

[Growlley]

No ? another typical american comapny ripping off the customer by failing to deliver.

Outsourcing

[nukenerd]

Another example of why it is a bad idea to outsource anything you or your staff can do themselves. My wife's boss wanted to outsource the company financial management, and when she asked "Why?" he had no better reason than than "Because everyone is doing it!". To me, "what everyone else is doing" is always a red flag in itself, showing that there is some very strong salesmanship going on somewhere, which in turn is motivivated by someone wanting to make some serious money at your expense.

Same boss, same