True love or true lies?
Internet dating sites sued for sharp practice
/v3-uk/news/1945821/internet-dating-sites-sued-sharp-practice
21 Nov 2005, Iain Thomson , V3
Two of the world's largest internet dating sites are being taken to court in class action lawsuits by subscribers claiming that they were mislead.
Match.com, the world's largest online dating site, has been accused in a legal action filed in Los Angeles of encouraging members to renew subscriptions by sending bogus emails pretending to be interested parties, and even employing people to go out on false dates.
Plaintiff Matthew Evans alleges that his 'match' confessed to being "date bait" working for Match.com with the aim of encouraging a testimonial, according to Reuters.
"This is a grossly fraudulent practice that Match.com is engaged in," said H. Scott Leviant, a lawyer at Los Angeles law firm Arias, Ozzello & Gignac LLP, which brought the suit.
Match.com members pay a monthly fee to read emails and converse with others on the website.
Spokeswoman Kristin Kelly said that Match.com "absolutely does not" employ people to go on dates with subscribers or to send members misleading emails professing romantic interest.
In a separate suit Yahoo's personals site was accused of padding its membership list with fake members.
A suit filed by Robert Anthony, of Broward County, Florida, alleges breach of contract, fraud and unfair trade practices. He is seeking class action status so that other users can join in.
Analyst firm ComScore Networks estimated that nearly half a billion dollars was spent by US consumers on online dating sites last year, making it the most popular non-pornographic online business.
© Incisive Media Investments Limited 2010, Published by Incisive Financial Publishing Limited, Haymarket House, 28-29 Haymarket, London SW1Y 4RX, are companies registered in England and Wales with company registration numbers 04252091 & 04252093
Do you agree?
NEVER use these online dating sites. NEVER!
Lets get this out of the way 1st: The online dating scene is a vunue not unlike real-life dating - it caters to the woman and treats the man like crap. Now that we all agree that men are treated like hungry pigs on these sites, lets move on...
MATCH.com definitely does employee these practices. I have male friends who have all told me that near to their subscription running out, they's *suddenly* begin to receive an interested message or two. But, as usual, the women would never reply. Hmm...... wonder why.
YAHOO.com allows HOOKERS and PROSTITUTES to place multiple ads on their sites. If you a diligent enough, you can search one city for a girl with a specific qualities and GUESS WHAT? She's also looking in other cities too! SAME PIC and profile is changed OH SO little just to get it saved as a non-duplicate.
GUYS - stay away from these sites. Girls who answer you on here AND WHO ARE REAL will never respect you - ever.
Posted by Melissa S., 21 Nov 2005
Fraud on Internet Dating Sites
I have recently had a subscription taken out on the Match.com site (for 6 months) that was not authorised or undertaken by myself. I had joined for 60 days over 2 years ago, but have never re-newed my subscription, due to not delivering the advertised results. I have notified my bank of this un-authorised transaction and would like to hear from any parties who know of similiar events.
Posted by Hezza, 22 Nov 2005
automatic renewal
I advised Match.com that as after 6 months I had met no one through them I wanted to take advantage of their offer i.e.if youve not met someone in 6 months we will renew without further charge, but if this was not an option please cancel membership. They deducted £29.71 from my credit card, without my authority, the next day and wont refund.
Posted by janet, 22 Nov 2005
Very interested in finding out more..
I am a Gold member member of another dating website and looged on today and ended up on line using someone elses account and I received a text message from a female friend who is a standard member of the same website who happens to be a lawyer we are thinking of starting our own Law suit against this company for breaching the privacy laws because other people logged on using our accounts and had access to our private emails and our credit card details aswell Please let me know how things are progressing with your case thanks..
Regards Vincent
Posted by Vincent Yarrow, 04 Jan 2008