{"id":13686,"date":"2022-09-01T14:59:14","date_gmt":"2022-09-01T14:59:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/scienceandnerds.com\/2022\/09\/01\/roomster-sued-by-the-ftc-and-six-state-ags-for-fake-listings-and-fake-app-store-reviews\/"},"modified":"2022-09-01T14:59:15","modified_gmt":"2022-09-01T14:59:15","slug":"roomster-sued-by-the-ftc-and-six-state-ags-for-fake-listings-and-fake-app-store-reviews","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/scienceandnerds.com\/2022\/09\/01\/roomster-sued-by-the-ftc-and-six-state-ags-for-fake-listings-and-fake-app-store-reviews\/","title":{"rendered":"Roomster sued by the FTC and six state AGs for fake listings and fake app store reviews"},"content":{"rendered":"

Source: https:\/\/www.theverge.com\/2022\/8\/31\/23330808\/roomster-ftc-lawsuit-app-store-google-play-fake-reviews<\/a>
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The Federal Trade Commission (FTC), along with six states<\/a>, filed a lawsuit against John Shriber and Roman Zaks, owners of the room renting and roommate finder platform Roomster, for allegedly defrauding consumers, accusing them of paying people for fake reviews and listings on their site. The agency says that the \u201cdeceptive tactics\u201d violated the FTC Act and state laws. <\/p>\n

In a complaint<\/a> filed by the FTC and the attorneys general of New York, California, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, and Massachusetts, the group alleges that Roomster released \u201ctens of thousands of fake positive reviews to bolster their false claims that properties listed on their Roomster platform are real, available, and verified.\u201d They also allege that Roomster would post fake listings on Craigslist to drive traffic to its platform, and charge anyone who inquired a fee for information on the listings that didn\u2019t exist. <\/p>\n

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FTC and the states also filed a proposed order against Jonathan Martinez\u2014who allegedly sold Roomster tens of thousands of fake reviews\u2014requiring him to pay $100,000 and cooperate in the FTC\u2019s case against Roomster. \/3<\/p>\n

\u2014 FTC (@FTC) August 30, 2022<\/a>\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

The FTC alleges that their accomplice in this scheme was Jonathan Martinez, who runs a site called AppWinn. The FTC accuses Roomster of asking Martinez for lots of five-star reviews, which he allegedly provided, using more than 2,500 iTunes accounts. Among the emails from Roomster to Martinez mentioned in the complaint, the FTC points out one asking him to \u201cmake sure it\u2019s always a random number of reviews, so it looks more natural,\u201d which was apparently sent after Roomster was notified of an FTC investigation.<\/p>\n

Martinez signed a proposed settlement<\/a> with the FTC saying that, in addition to his cooperation with the prosecutors, he would pay a $100,000 fine that would go to the six states, ban him from selling reviews and endorsements, notify both the Apple App Store and Google Play Store that Roomster paid him to post these reviews, and identify the \u201cfake reviews and the approximate times they were posted.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAlthough the Roomster Defendants claim that their Roomster platform provides \u2018verified\u2019 and \u2018authentic\u2019 living arrangement listings, in many instances it does not,\u201d the FTC and AGs write. \u201cInstead the Roomster Defendants rely on fake reviews (thousands of which were purchased from Defendant Martinez alone) and fake listings to get consumers to pay for access to rental information that is unverified and, in many instances, does that exist.\u201d<\/p>\n

In addition to the false reviews, the complaint stated that Roomster would label \u201cverified listings\u201d on its site. In one instance, the FTC discovered in its investigation that \u201cthe company immediately accepted and published a fake listing for a fictional apartment at the same address as a U.S. Post Office commercial facility.\u201d <\/p>\n

The FTC looking into Roomster as a part of a crackdown on online platforms for misleading consumers on the Internet. In January, the FTC fined online clothing retailer Fashion Nova<\/a> $4.2 million for allegedly misrepresenting customers through reviews and endorsements. After enforcing the fine, Fashion Nova didn\u2019t confirm or deny the accusations. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n


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Source: https:\/\/www.theverge.com\/2022\/8\/31\/23330808\/roomster-ftc-lawsuit-app-store-google-play-fake-reviews<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Source: The Federal Trade Commission (FTC), along with six states, filed a lawsuit against John Shriber and Roman Zaks, owners of the room renting and roommate finder platform Roomster, for allegedly defrauding consumers, accusing them of paying people for fake reviews and listings on their site. The agency says that the \u201cdeceptive tactics\u201d violated the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13687,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,8],"tags":[16],"class_list":["post-13686","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-policy","category-technology","tag-policy"],"yoast_head":"\nRoomster sued by the FTC and six state AGs for fake listings and fake app store reviews - Science and Nerds<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/scienceandnerds.com\/2022\/09\/01\/roomster-sued-by-the-ftc-and-six-state-ags-for-fake-listings-and-fake-app-store-reviews\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Roomster sued by the FTC and six state AGs for fake listings and fake app store reviews - Science and Nerds\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Source: The Federal Trade Commission (FTC), along with six states, filed a lawsuit against John Shriber and Roman Zaks, owners of the room renting and roommate finder platform Roomster, for allegedly defrauding consumers, accusing them of paying people for fake reviews and listings on their site. The agency says that the \u201cdeceptive tactics\u201d violated the […]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/scienceandnerds.com\/2022\/09\/01\/roomster-sued-by-the-ftc-and-six-state-ags-for-fake-listings-and-fake-app-store-reviews\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Science and Nerds\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2022-09-01T14:59:14+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2022-09-01T14:59:15+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/scienceandnerds.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/roomster-sued-by-the-ftc-and-six-state-ags-for-fake-listings-and-fake-app-store-reviews_6310c8c2e14ce.jpeg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1200\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"628\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/scienceandnerds.com\/2022\/09\/01\/roomster-sued-by-the-ftc-and-six-state-ags-for-fake-listings-and-fake-app-store-reviews\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/scienceandnerds.com\/2022\/09\/01\/roomster-sued-by-the-ftc-and-six-state-ags-for-fake-listings-and-fake-app-store-reviews\/\",\"name\":\"Roomster sued by the FTC and six state AGs for fake listings and fake app store reviews - 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