| U.S. Federal Trade Commission |
FTC News Release, Feb 4, 2008
Judge Agrees with FTC, Orders Spammers to Pay More Than $2.5 Million and
Stop Selling Bogus Weight-Loss and Anti-Aging Products
At the request of the Federal Trade Commission, a federal judge has ordered
Sili Neutraceuticals, LLC and Brian McDaid to pay more than $2.5 million for
making false advertising claims and sending illegal e-mail messages in violation
of the FTC Act and the CAN-SPAM Act (Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited
Pornography and Marketing Act).
On January 23, U.S. District Court Judge David H. Coar ordered the company
and McDaid, individually and doing business as Kaycon, Ltd., to stop
misrepresenting any products or services, including hoodia - or human growth
hormone-related (HGH) products, and stop sending illegal spam. The court also
entered a judgment against the defendants in the amount of $2,569,851.77. In
August 2007, the FTC charged the defendants with CAN-SPAM violations and making
false and unsubstantiated claims about hoodia weight-loss products and HGH
anti-aging products, and a district court judge ordered a freeze of their assets
and a halt to the e-mails and product claims.
Judge Coar found that the defendants violated the FTC Act by falsely claiming
that the hoodia products cause rapid and substantial and permanent weight loss,
and that the HGH products contain human growth hormone and/or cause a clinically
meaningful increase in growth hormone levels and/or will turn back or reverse
the aging process. The CAN-SPAM Act violations were sending commercial e-mail
messages that have misleading subject headings, and that fail to provide clear
and conspicuous notice of the opportunity to decline to receive further spam
from the sender, and/or a functioning return e-mail address, and the senders’
valid physical postal address. According to the FTC’s complaint, the spam drove
traffic to the defendants’ Web sites, which sold the products.
The FTC would like to thank SecureWorks and Microsoft for their assistance in
this matter.
The text in this article was prepared by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission.