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All About Advertising Law

FTC Commissioner Seeks to Resurrect Penalty Offense Authority

By Leonard L. Gordon, Mary M. Gardner & Michael A. Munoz

November 11, 2020

At the end of last month, FTC Commissioner Rohit Chopra and his attorney advisor, Samuel Levine, penned an article, “The Case for Resurrecting the FTC Act’s Penalty Offense Authority.” In the article, the authors posit that, because the FTC’s “ability to seek monetary relief through Section 13(b) is now in jeopardy,” the FTC should “resurrect one of the key authorities it abandoned in the 1980s”—the Penalty Offense Authority under Section 5(m)(1)(b) of the…

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Getting the Yardage: District Court Locks in on Rangefinder Company’s False Claims

By Leonard L. Gordon & Michael A. Munoz

October 30, 2020

A case about golf and advertising was too good for us not to write about. Recently, the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California issued a tentative preliminary injunction against GolfzonDeca, Inc. for marketing its GolfBuddy rangefinder. For you non-golfers, a rangefinder is a device that tells a golfer how far they are from the hole or other point on the course.[1] Golfers continually strive for equipment that might help them lower…

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FTC Commissioner Warns Larger Companies and Payment Processors, Seeks Greater Financial Penalties

By Leonard L. Gordon, Ellen T. Berge & Mary M. Gardner

October 30, 2020

On October 19, 2020, the Federal Trade Commission issued its annual report to Congress regarding the FTC’s efforts to protect senior citizens from fraud and abuse. In the report, the FTC noted that adults over 60 are more likely to report losing money to certain types of alleged scams, including romance scams, imposter scams, and online shopping programs. Moreover, the FTC reports that seniors were more than six times more likely than younger consumers to…

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Ad Law in the Age of COVID-19 and Regulatory Reactions

By Melissa Landau Steinman & Kristen R. Klesh

October 20, 2020

The COVID-19 crisis has spawned a new wave of predatory behavior toward consumers, with the marketing of coronavirus-related products and untested cures. Regulators have responded to these behaviors swiftly and in a variety of ways. Richard Cleland, assistant director – division of advertising practices at the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), and Venable attorneys Melissa Steinman and Kristen Klesh addressed the advertising enforcement trends stemming from the COVID-19 pandemic and offered their reflections on best practices…

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A Fireside Chat and Crystal Ball Readings with FTC Attorney Advisors

By Eric S. Berman & Daniel S. Blynn

October 12, 2020

Venable attorneys Eric Berman and Dan Blynn hosted a virtual fireside chat with attorney advisors to four current Federal Trade Commission (FTC) commissioners. Touching on each commissioner’s background and enforcement priorities, the FTC attorney advisors offered insights into best practices and insider perspectives on interacting with the FTC through a series of questions and answers, posed by the Venable team and submitted by audience members. Each panelist spoke on their own behalf, and not on…

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Disgorgement Denied: Third Circuit Hands FTC a Tough Pill to Swallow Over Section 13(b) Authority

By Leonard L. Gordon, Mary M. Gardner & Michael A. Munoz

October 1, 2020

Yesterday, the Third Circuit issued an opinion in Federal Trade Commission v. AbbVie, Inc., joining the Seventh Circuit in holding that the FTC is not entitled to seek disgorgement under Section 13(b) of the FTC Act. The decision reflects a potential turning of the tides on how courts view FTC’s statutory authority to seek monetary relief. By way of background, the district court ordered the AbbVie defendants to disgorge $448 million in alleged ill-gotten…

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VoIP, Meet VoIR—FTC Settlement Signals That Voice over Internet Robocall Service Providers Are Fair Game

By Leonard L. Gordon, Elliot Kelly & Helen M. Chen

September 29, 2020

The FTC’s pursuit of companies purportedly engaged in telemarketing scams is nothing new, but its recent settlement with a company that allegedly assisted a fraudulent telemarketer by providing a Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) service is the first of its kind. VoIP is a technology that allows a company to make voice calls using a broadband Internet connection instead of a regular (or analog) phone line. VoIP services can make telemarketing more efficient and cheaper—particularly for…

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The New Normal? Executive Guidance Asks Agencies to Reform Enforcement Policy

By Leonard L. Gordon, Helen M. Chen & Michael A. Munoz

September 24, 2020

Given all the tumult with natural disasters, COVID-19, and other goings on in Washington, a memorandum directing government agencies to reform how they operate may have gone unnoticed. It’s worth considering. On August 31, 2020, the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), a subagency within the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), issued Memorandum M-20-31 (the “Memo”), which elaborates on and implements directives from a prior executive order to consider and adopt certain best…

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FTC Partners with State AGs in Latest Crackdown on Charity Fundraising

By Eric S. Berman

September 22, 2020

The past five years have seen a major uptick in FTC enforcement against alleged charity fundraising scams, along with increased multi-state coordination in this space. Regular readers of this blog already know that, by having read this, this, this, and this. On September 15, 2020, the FTC filed a complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York against fundraiser Outreach Calling, its owner and principal Mark…

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FTC Schools Marketers on the ABCs of Negative Option Marketing

By Leonard L. Gordon & William Lawrence

September 16, 2020

We have written previously about the FTC’s vigorous enforcement efforts relating to negative option marketing and its crackdown on alleged wrongdoing seeking to exploit the difficulties presented by COVID-19 (see blog posts here and here). Recently, the FTC continued its efforts with a complaint and settlement concerning negative option marketing to parents seeking online educational resources for their children. On September 1, 2020, the FTC brought a complaint against online children’s education company Age…

All About Advertising Law

Regulatory and Litigation Developments for Advertisers and Marketers

Blog Authors

FTC Commissioner Seeks to Resurrect Penalty Offense Authority

Getting the Yardage: District Court Locks in on Rangefinder Company’s False Claims

FTC Commissioner Warns Larger Companies and Payment Processors, Seeks Greater Financial Penalties

Ad Law in the Age of COVID-19 and Regulatory Reactions

A Fireside Chat and Crystal Ball Readings with FTC Attorney Advisors

Disgorgement Denied: Third Circuit Hands FTC a Tough Pill to Swallow Over Section 13(b) Authority

VoIP, Meet VoIR—FTC Settlement Signals That Voice over Internet Robocall Service Providers Are Fair Game

The New Normal? Executive Guidance Asks Agencies to Reform Enforcement Policy

FTC Partners with State AGs in Latest Crackdown on Charity Fundraising

FTC Schools Marketers on the ABCs of Negative Option Marketing

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