Dear Readers,

Due to economic considerations, Consumers Union has decided to shut down Consumer Reports WebWatch as of July 31, 2009.

Along with our parent site, Consumer Reports WebWatch, the UnSponsored Link will remain online as a consumer resource, but we'll no longer be able to follow-up on your comments or investigation requests. As such, for our last post, we’d like to highlight some of the techniques we’ve used to uncover the dozens of online scams we’ve exposed in this blog. We hope you’ll be able to use these methods to spot an online scam before you find yourself scammed.

1. Does the site provide full contact information?
Credible Web sites should clearly disclose the physical location where they are produced, including an address, a telephone number or e-mail address. Although this information is typically found on a “contact us” or “about us” page, some sites stick it in the privacy policy (usually at the very bottom) or terms of use, so you may have to do some clicking and scrolling. If all else fails, check the return policy for an address. If you’ve exhausted all these options and still can’t find an address, find another site.

Continue reading "Farewell from The UnSponsored Link" »

Posted by Jorgen Wouters at 03:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Sweden's Pirate Party secured a seat in the European Parliament after winning 7.1% of the Swedish vote, a major victory for a party dedicated to reforming copyright law, dismantling the patent system and preserving online privacy.

Despite its name, the Pirate Party is no joke. Founded in 2006 with the launch of its website, the Piratpartiet is now Sweden's third-largest in terms of membership (it's especially popular among the young and Web-savvy), and came in fifth place in the European Parliament elections behind the Social Democrats, Greens, Liberals and the Moderate Party.

Continue reading "Pirate Party Seizes a Euro Parliament Seat " »

Posted by Jorgen Wouters at 11:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

As if a class-action lawsuit wasn't bad enough, it turns out the antics of our old friends at Webloyalty.com have aroused the attentions of the Senate Commerce Committee, according to the Washington Post blog Small Change. Last week, writes Post reporter Ylan Mui, the Commerce Committee sent a letter to Webloyalty seeking more information about its billing practices.

As we wrote earlier this year, Webloyalty made money from customers who (often unwittingly) paid monthly fees to the consumer discount clubs it operated, including Reservation Rewards, Shoppers Discounts & Rewards, Members Specials, Buyer Assurance, Distinctive Privileges, PC Protection Plus, Travel Values, Travel Values Plus, Classmates Rewards and Wallet Shield.

Continue reading "Webloyalty.com Faces Senate Scrutiny" »

Posted by Jorgen Wouters at 01:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

A reader sent us the following e-mail last week:

Sent: Thursday, May 28, 2009 8:46 PM
Subject: Help - Please
http://www.rbausa.com
Is the above company a legit health care provider?
Mike

While we can't say for sure if Real Benefits Association actually is a legitimate health care provider, we can say that we suggest looking elsewhere for health insurance.

Why? First off, the RBA's site fails the WebWatch smell test, due to the lack of a privacy policy. The site contained a number of other read flags as well, including a "Disclaimer" link takes you to a page with temporary text, an "In the News Link that leads to a blank 'coming soon' page and a "More About Company" link on the homepage that steers you to a dead page.

Continue reading "Real Benefits Association Gets a Failing Grade from the BBB" »

Posted by Jorgen Wouters at 11:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)