The Attorney General of the state of New York, Andrew Cuomo, has issued legal subpoenas to a number of retailers doing business on the World Wide Web. The merchants, including Barnes & Noble, GameStop, Staples, and Ticketmaster, all pass consumer information to marketing firms (third parties) in the process of carrying out online transactions, which may be against the law. Twenty-two popular sites face inquiry into the ways that they collect and share consumer credit card information without obtaining information. Cuomo has warned these retailers that he’ll be determining whether they’ve taken part in the “deceptive” practice of “linking unsuspecting consumers to fee-based membership programs that charge unauthorized feeds under the guise of discount offers.”
The practice was explained in this way on MSNBC, and I thought it was simple enough to understand. Let’s say that you pop over to any one of these sites to make a purchase. At the point when the transaction is completed and the merchant has made their sale, a pop-up window appears on your screen offering you either money or a percentage off your next purchase with that retailer. If you click the ad because you are interested by the offer, you are taken to a third-party website where you are prompted to sign up for an annual subscription service – it might be a travel club, discount program, or credit card protection subscription. The annual cost is usually quite high, averaging between one hundred and one hundred forty-five dollars. That should be criminal enough in and of itself, but the problem is that your credit card information is shared between the original retailer and this new party, because your information is already inputted on the form. Regardless of whether or not you actually wanted that information shared, the website you chose to use for your purchase went ahead and gave it. Maybe THEY trust that third-party service, but you shouldn’t blindly have to.
The companies in question say that they will cooperate fully with the subpoena for more information, although they deny any wrongdoing.
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