Yet another acai berry "review" site pretending to give consumer advice while hawking products. Anonymous site registration, of course, and a particularly funny "disclaimer/terms of use" link: "All of our reviews are based on our own observations and are believed to be accurate. We cannot be held liable for anything that we have failed to represent properly. We attempt to keep our information up to date and accurate, but do not make any guarantees. It is your responsibility to read the privacy policy, terms of service, and disclaimer of the rental service before you register with them."

Rental service? We thought these were acai berry experts. Did somebody just cut-and-paste this from another site?

Posted by Beau Brendler at 05:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Then there's this. It's NOT phentermine. This stuff is made from hoodia. The Web site is another private proxy domain, surprise, surprise. We've also found phentirimine. But hey, feel safe! There's a seal of approval on this site (the words on it aren't legible) that says the product complies with its own, self-authored best phentirimine manufacturing practices!

Posted by Beau Brendler at 03:41 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The FDA and the FTC really ought to crack down on sites like this one. How is it not deceptive advertising to spell the name of some weight loss supplement "phentremine" in order to trick people into thinking they're going to get phentermine? Not to mention it's unfair to people with dyslexia.

By the way, phentermine is half of what used to be called "fen-phen," which had a tendency to blow out people's hearts.

Posted by Beau Brendler at 03:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Here's yet another product site claiming to be a consumer advocate -- in fact, it calls itself the "official watchdog group of the Acai industry."

Acai fruit comes from palm trees in the Brazilian and other rainforests. It's also become a trendy diet food ascribed all sorts of magical powers (for the lowdown on acai's nutritional value, see Consumer Reports' health blog). What's amusing about this self-proclaimed acai berry watchdog is that it appears to have lifted its main graphic and mission statement ("Expose, Confront, Change") from a real organization, the Calfornia-based ConsumerWatchdog.org.

The domain owner used private proxy registration, so you know the acai site is probably bogus. It's also got an array of logos from major media outlets that don't lead to anything, as if to proclaim that the site's been talked about on TV and in the mainstream press. And, of course, acai berry itself has been talked about in the mainstream press, but this site hasn't. Until now! What a lucky site.

One of the acai sites it in turn recommends, Acai Burn, is also privately registered, though we did get a very nice person on the other end of the line when we called (800) 659-3588. Acai Burn is not available in stores, only by phone order and via the Web site, which is "encrypted and all," according to the nice customer rep. We were trying to figure out, of course, if the acai "consumer advocate" site owns Acai Burn, but we can't quite make the link.

From the acai "consumer advocate" site, there's also a link to "Acai Berry All Natural Cleansing Formula," which also adopts the "as seen on TV" trick, this time displaying logos of big media outlets with quotes that talk about Acai itself, not the actual product for sale on this site. This site's also privately registered, and is affiliated with "www.phentremine.com."
Note the spelling of the URL above, in bold, carefully. Clearly, it's meant to confuse consumers into believing that what they are going to get is actually phentermine, an anti-obesity prescription drug.

Any company that plays around with the spellings of potentially dangerous drugs is not selling products you need.

Posted by Beau Brendler at 02:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Check out this unusual 419 Scam e-mail. The number "419" refers to the article of the Nigerian Criminal Code dealing with fraud. We get these all the time, but this is the first one we've seen purporting to be from a U.S. serviceman, rather than the finance minister of a West African nation. But typical of most 419 e-mails, the poor grammar is a dead giveaway. Also, the U.N. mission in Iraq does not include U.S. troops.

________________________________________
From: George Grant [georgegrant76@msn.com]
Sent: Tuesday, February 24, 2009 5:25 PM
To: georgegrant76@msn.com
Subject: How Are You?

How are you doing......hope you are having a great day?

I don't know how you will see this, but I want to ask for your assistance in this business, I’m Spc George Grant, an American, working with the United nations troop stationed in Iraq, and there is a business I want you to assist me carry out.

I will be very happy and thankful, if you can assist me get this done.

I expect you acceptance letter, and be also informed that a degree of urgency should be attached to this, Because I really can’t say what happens in Iraq tomorrow, I might be redeployed anytime.

I think this will be of much benefit to me, and you and probably humanity.

Hope to hear from you soon

Sincerely,

Spc. George Grant.

Posted by Jorgen Wouters at 09:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

We recently received this e-mail from a reader:

I am seeing a lot of sites advertising free government grants. I would like to know if they are scams or if there is such a thing. Every site I go into asks for money. Could you please let me know if this is true. My husband and I are just receiving Social Security and we do not want to be taken for any money. I would appreciate you letting me know if there is such a grant available or is it just a bunch of crooks out there.

Thank You
Barbara

Even without knowing which sites Barbara is talking about, the first thing we’d advise anyone is never to pay for anything that’s purportedly “free.”

We’d also suggest avoiding any site the claims to be federal government-related and doesn’t use the ".gov" domain name. For instance, there is a legitimate U.S. government site called www.grants.gov, but as it points out on its homepage: “Grants.gov does not provide personal financial assistance.” Although it does provide links to other government sites for consumers seeking assistance with student loans, small business start-up loans and personal help such as disaster recovery, none of these requests an upfront payment.

Finally, we’d also suggest reading a useful Federal Trade Commission alert “Free Government Grants’: Don’t Take Them For Grant-ed.” Beyond pointing out that the only official access point for all federal grant-making agencies is www.grants.gov, the alert offers a number of useful tips and notes that these "free grant" offers are typically scams and rip-offs.

Posted by Jorgen Wouters at 02:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

No doubt you've probably received a spam e-mail from Canadian Pharmacy. Maybe you were even tempted to buy some Cialis or other type of erectile dysfunction drug, often the main subject of the spam (though this example of a bogus online pharmacy shows a pretty wide array of meds). A Russian organization called GlavMed (go ahead, check it out, you have to admit the logo is kind of cool) is behind Canadian Pharmacy and who knows how many other illegal online pharmacy operations. You should also read I Kill Spammers' open letter to law enforcement on Glavmed's activities. Through our friends at Knujon, we've also come across what appears to be a manifesto for extending the organization's reach in the United States, which it seems to view as an easy target. If anybody out there knows Russian, we could use a little bit of translation help. We'll post more here on GlavMed in coming days, and anybody out there who knows more about them, let us know.

Posted by Beau Brendler at 11:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Today, WebWatch is publishing a new report: Photos on the Web: A Consumer’s Guide, a primer designed to help consumers make sense of Web-based imagery. The report was written by WebWatch adviser Fred Ritchin, director of PixelPress and professor of photography and imaging at New York University. Fred just published his second book, After Photography, which examines these issues in greater depth.

Along with this report, we’ve created a tip sheet for consumers to help them manage their increasingly digital lives online. We hope you find it useful. Click on the link below:

“Manipulation” of imagery has been around since people could draw pictures. However, the Internet can make distribution of fake images more rapid and widespread than ever before. Is this a big deal? Perhaps not, if it’s one of those e-mails from your friends with a couple of dozen cc’s and "Have You Seen This?” typed in the subject line.

Also, you might say that in U.S. culture, we are used to the idea of celebrity pictures in glossy magazines being “retouched” or “photoshopped.” The actress Jennifer Aniston recently hinted on ABC-TV’s “The View” that her nude picture on the cover of GQ magazine was “photoshopped.” Whether that means artists used subtle shading to highlight the nearly 40-year-old actress’ physical attributes, or assembled the image from stock photos, we will probably never know.

Of course, this kind of technology and dissemination can be abused. What if, in the critical closing weeks of a presidential campaign, someone circulated an altered image of a leading candidate in a compromising position? That actually happened in the 2004 election, as our report describes. Our culture searches for the perfect moment, the perfect body, the perfect smile, the perfect confluence of events to capture an event or demonstrate a point of view. And so, are many of us aspiring to resemble an aesthetic of human perfection that doesn’t exist? Are we seeking to reduce a complex reality into a perfect-package moment in time, when all the proper characters, locations and symbols appear at once, because our intelligence isn't trusted to grasp complexity?

These are large questions without simple answers. For the purposes of daily living and digital image literacy, here are some tips from Consumer Reports WebWatch to keep in mind:

1. As anyone who has tried to take a family picture with young children and pets knows, the “perfect” photographic moment is hard to achieve. The well-worn consumer caution, “if it looks too good to be true, it is,” can be applied to photos and video on the Internet as well.

2. As anyone who has purchased school pictures knows, you can pay a few extra bucks to have your child’s photos “retouched” to remove blemishes, chocolate smears in the corner of the mouth and other anomalies. On the Web, context is critical. “Before-and-after” images demonstrating weight loss, the miracles of skin creams, and attractive potential mates just waiting to talk to you should be treated with skepticism.

3. Technically, it’s easier to alter a single image than hundreds of them, as would appear in frames in video. However, digital video editing software can raise similar manipulation concerns.

4. Manipulated or not, when placing images of yourself or your family online on community, social networking or video sites such as Flickr, Facebook and YouTube, you should consider the ramifications carefully. Think of the genie that’s hard to put back in the bottle: Photos and video that enter the digital domain, remain. They may follow you for a long time, and they may present a picture to a future employer, or spouse or partner you might regret. Hence, there’s a growing business in online reputation management.

5. You may decide to play around with software such as Photoshop. Consider your responsibility as a Web publisher and tell people on your Web site, blog or photo file if you drastically alter the composition of a photo in order to make a point. For more on this, read the sections in our report on compositing, photo illustrations and other types of imagery construction.

Many major media organizations publish their guidelines for publication of photos and video, for their own staffs and for “citizen journalists” and amateurs. We’ve compiled a list here.

Finally, for a fascinating discussion on the power of the still image to shape events and opinions, check out this analysis of photographs of former President Bush by the photo editors of several major news services, led by documentary filmmaker and Werner Herzog associate Errol Morris.

Posted by Jorgen Wouters at 10:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

As promised, here’s part two of a response to the following e-mail from a reader.

I was wondering if you know whether or not the following online work at home programs are legitimate: Michael Andrews' Profit Lance, or The Process at Home System. Do you know where I can find whether or not a program is legitimate?

Earl

We've already looked at Profitlance.com, so this week, we’ll turn our attention to ProcessAtHome.com, which calls itself the “#1 Work at Home Program.”

Like another site we recently examined, ProcessAtHome.com greets you with a video pop-up, this one by Angel Stevens, who looks and sounds somewhat like Amy Poehler as she welcomes users to her site:

“Hi there, I’m Angel Stevens, and let me tell you, if you’re looking to work at home, and make serious money, you’re exactly in the right place. Let me tell you why. Many people know me as the #1 work-at-home consultant in America.”

From what we discovered, some people know Angel by a few other terms as well, but more on that in a minute. First, like many "work-at-home" sites, ProcessAtHome.com fails to meet WebWatch’s guidelines for Web credibility by failing to disclose any contact information beyond an e-mail address. A WHOIS search of the site's ownership revealed a registration by proxy. So Angel seems keen to hide her identity and location, which doesn't inspire confidence.

ProccessAtHome.com’s homepage is spartan compared to many other work-at-home sites -- no scrolling page of graphics, testimonials and exhortations -- and invites users to enter their zip code, first name and e-mail. So we decided to try three different entries for three recently out-of-work people to see what Angel had to offer them:

-Bernie 10028 bernie@madoff.com
-Dick 82601 dick@cheney.com
-George 76638 george@bush.com

Here’s what we got:

Congratulations Bernie!
We have 2 positions available in New York, NY
Read the report below immediately to check if you can be approved. Your position is secured for the next 15 minutes.

Congratulations Dick!
We have 2 positions available in Casper, WY
Read the report below immediately to check if you can be approved. Your position is secured for the next 15 minutes.

Congratulations George!
We have 2 positions available in Crawford, TX
Read the report below immediately to check if you can be approved. Your position is secured for the next 15 minutes.

Seems like a pattern here. And these pages display more of what we’ve come to expect from similar sites, i.e. endlessly scrolling pages (34 screens, no less), “testimonials” and pictures of Lamborghinis, Lear Jets and cabin cruisers that can be yours if you send Angel $197 so she can teach you the secrets to becoming a “qualified and effective affiliate rebate processor.”

Like other such sites we've examined, ProccessAtHome.com pastes unlinked logos of major media outlets alongside claims of “as seen on.” We searched all the sites mentioned and found: The New York Times (nothing) , CNN Interactive (sponsored links) USA today (sponsored links), Forbes .com (nothing), MSN (sponsored links), Yahoo (sponsored links), AOL (sponsored links) and Esquire (nothing). So, we'd like to make sure it's clear to would-be entrepreneurs out there: Just because you buy an ad in the New York Times, that doesn't mean you have the leeway to labe your product Web site "as seen in the New York Times."

We looked up ProcessAtHome.com on ripoffreport.com and found 90 complaints, with headlines such as:

-“Angel Stevens Process At Home Deceptive Advertising/No Support/ Another Scam”

-“Angel Stevens And Process At Home Process At Home-Info is all useless fluff and promised refunds IMPOSSIBLE to obtain”

-“Process At Home - Angel Stevens rip me off”

-“Angel Stevens Process At Home Don't Get Fooled By This One”

-“Process At Home, Angel Stevens This company sent no information after payment, does no reply to emails! Rip-off”

-“Process At Home By Angel Stevens This company or person took my money and wont give it back”

But we'll let the Better Business Bureau have the last word here. According to BBB records, Angel (whose real name is apparently Angela), is based in Santa Monica, California, and in the two years since she’s been in business, the BBB has registered 398 complaints against her while giving her “#1 Work at Home Program” an F, meaning, in the BBB's words: "We strongly question the company’s reliability for reasons such as that they have failed to respond to complaints, their advertising is grossly misleading, they are not in compliance with the law’s licensing or registration requirements, their complaints contain especially serious allegations, or the company’s industry is known for its fraudulent business practices."

Any questions?

Posted by Jorgen Wouters at 11:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)