Love And The Law: Online Dating Lawsuits

LEGAL TALK NETWORK - Apr 21 - Some estimates say 20M Americans use internet dating services. But when things don’t work out, should the dating service be held accountable and to what extent? Attorneys and co-hosts Bob Ambrogi and J. Craig Williams welcome Mark Brooks, an authority on the business of internet dating and Principal Consultant at Courtland Brooks and Brian Carver, Assistant Professor at UC Berkeley’s School of Information, to discuss recent litigation against dating sites. Mark and Brian take a look at a recent lawsuits, background checks and online dating sites legal responsibility.

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Comments

[Dave]

I've read your opinion on the recent match.com lawsuit, and with all due respect your claim that the company is being targeted because it is profitable (wow 38 million in revenue, not exactly Exxon Mobil) is one based on ignorance. I would respectfully request that you create your own profile, pick a hometown that is small (Greensboro, North Carolina, Charlotte, North Carolina) and experience the fraud for yourself, as I have as a never married, educated, good looking guy with no kids.

The company engages in fraud by creating fake profiles to pique male interest in subscribing. This practice is especially blatant in small towns where there really aren't many desireable females, and thus the company must fraudently create an artificial market that does not exist. This is not about scammers rampant on Internet sites, this is about a company creating fake profiles on their own. I've met at least 350 women on match.com, and haven't met at least 500 others who cut off contact with me for absolutely no reason, yet still remained on the site for years. If the profile is inactive, as is one of your theories, then the profile would not say "active within 24 hours." I've actually busted 10 different women for fake profiles, and within 2 hours their profile is down, but who do you complain to? I can't complain to the company itself when they are complicit in the fraud. I will actually log out as well to make sure that their profile has not just been hidden from me, it's been taken down all together.

In closing, I have had my share of experiences on match that would make alot of guys jealous, but I've had even more where the person has cut off contact for no reason other than the fact that they do not exist, and thus can't actually meet me in person. If you still don't believe me, I would be more than happy to go through profiles with you on the phone and show you exactly which ones are fake. If one isn't willing to see for themselves, I really don't think they are in a position to comment. It's pretty obvious Mark, and frankly I'm surprised this site still exists.

[Sam Moorcroft, ChristianCafe.com]

"Dave", as you saying that Match.com's daily intake of 20,000+ people a day creating new accounts themselves isn't enough? That they also have an army of monkeys at keyboards creating fake accounts to supplement the 20,000?

Think about that for a moment. They'd have to have 100's of staff sitting around creating fake accounts all day.

Unless, of course, they have robots doing this for them, based on pre-set templates (say, 50 versions). However, you'd see a pattern pretty quickly and start to notice all the duplicate accounts (save for the stated location).

But, again, with that 20,000 daily intake, why would they do what you are suggesting? It makes no sense (never mind the legal implications and bad-for-business reasons).

[joe]

I'm on match, but am not a paid member. I think the problem is that most girls are window shoppers and unpaid members, so they can't respond to any messages. Also, some people just like talking online, but have no desire to meet in person, because they are unconfident or already in a relationship with someone else/dating other people, etc.

[JB]

To Dave,I'm not sure how the small markets work because I've never created a "recon" profile in one.So maybe they(Match) do things different there.Here in the Chicago area I'm pretty sure they're not doing that sort of thing but of course there's no way WE can prove it.Like you,I'm pretty adept at spotting "fake" profiles and yes they take them down fairly quickly when I report them.Match doesn't really have to put them up because there's enough real people that do for a myriad of reasons.

Millions of women "disappear" after 2 or 3 emails everyday on men on every dating site in the world including free ones like Plenty Of Fish you can't blame Match for female behavior.On Match you can see if a woman read the email you sent them so I doubt they have a room full people somewhere marking these emails as "read" or emailing you back 3 times etc.... just to keep YOU subscribed or renew.I think suing Match is futile because you'd never be able to prove any of it.Just be happy you met the 350 most guys never meet ANY...lol

[Dave]

1.Where do you get the numbers of 20,000+ a day? Show me specific evidence of that. You got that from the web-site. Just because a web-site claims that doesn't mean it is legit.

2. There aren't armies of people sitting around. It is very easy to create a fake profile. Have you ever been on the site?

3. Segue to above yes, there are pre-set templates- preferences that you don't have to fill out that will just go to a default setting. You can get a profile up and running VERY quickly.

4. My sense is that you have never been on the site, because you don't seem to understand what I am talking about. If you actually did an in depth investigation, you would see that the fraud is there.

5. Once again, I have met a TON of women on match, and not meant a TON of others who initiated contact with me. These people did not ask me for money, nor try and direct me to another site. Yes, SOME of them you can excuse as just falling off for whatever reasons, but they all still had their profiles up and running, and they all had very similar profile information.

1. Cliche laden content ( I can mud wrestle in pig slop, then get dressed to the nines for an opera on the same day-sarcasm but you get the idea) and phraselogy that is the same and appears professionally written- probably because it is.

2. No information provided germane to the town where they claim to reside. You claim to live in a place for 3 years yet can't name one local place or hot spot you like to frequent? What are you doing the other 49 weeks of the year when you aren't allegedly traveling to France, Italy, or the Bahamas?

3. Height preferences to the default setting/ no height parameter- this makes no sense because height is a BIG deal for most women. I don't know any women looking for a 5 foot 4 guy. Height is more important than a guy having hair if you were to ask most single women. I surmise that this is just a function of the match employee simply being lazy in creation of the fake profile.

[dave]

They don't have to create fake profiles in Chi-town because there is enough of a dating pool there already of legitimate desireable women. Did you read what I said above- I have actually busted women for fake profiles, and they have been taken down. Sure, there are SOME women that disappear after a few e-mails, but as long as I have been doing this off and on, I have found that 99% of the profiles all follow the same patterns as I have explained above. In some cases, the profile content is almost word for word. Ask yourself, if someone isn't asking you for money, or directing you to another site, what is the purpose of an attractive profile who initiates contact with you, and then cuts it off abruptly, other than to whet ones appetite for the site? "Disappear," is not the right word because their profile is still on-line and active.

Yes, I am grateful for meeting all the women I have met, have had some interesting experiences that I will remember, but there are also hundreds of others who don't "disappear," and who's profiles are all very similar.

[Dave]

Yes, it is true that there a few unpaid members, but those are the ones who wink at you and then when you send an e-mail do not reply because they can't. I'm talking about an attractive woman in a small town initiating contact with me, taking the time to write me a 4-5 paragraph e-mail, and then all of a sudden cutting off contact with me for absolutely no reason, yet still having an active profile. For all I HAVE met, I've not met even more who have been like this, and 95% of these same women have very similar profile content when you do further research. They are "ringers" created by the company in certain areas of the country where the dating sucks. It is fraud: Think about it, if you are a legit good looking guy with no kids, educated, never married, are you going to pay to join a site in a town where all the profiles are of obese, divorced, uneducated women with 3 kids?

[Sam Moorcroft, ChristianCafe.com]

Dave, according to Compete.com, Match had 12,197,177 unique visitors in March 2011 (http://siteanalytics.compete.com/match.com/). So, a figure of 20,000 daily new people more than makes sense. If anything, it is much more than that.

Let me put this in perspective: we attract 500 new people daily (we're a niche site) and our uniques were 82,502 in the same period. Match's daily new people figures are 40x ours, yet their uniques are 147x. Again, a figure of 20,000 is eminently reasonable.

With the kind of traffic they enjoy, why on earth would they need to create fake profiles? We don't (it's unconscionable and we really have better things to do). Why would they need to with their traffic volumes? It doesn't make any sense at all.

[Dave]

Sam,
As I said above, the fraud was initially not readily apparent in large cities (even for me), where most of those daily new visitors are coming from. However, I began to pick on a mountain of things that were similar from the profiles I deemed to have been artificially created. Match.com does not need to artificially create a market in New York City, Chicago, L.A, etc. It is very apparent that they need to in small cities, where dating life is poor to non-existent (see my response to Joe). You seem intelligent, this should make sense to you. I have no problem with a company trying to maximize profitability, but not in a fraudulent manner.

As a larger point, I respect your opinions, but honestly unless you've been doing this off and on for time that I have, it is very hard to understand the fraud unless you have experienced it first hand. Certainly there are Nigerian scammers, and spammers (trying to con you into things) that proliferate EVERY Internet site. What I am talking about is something completely different.

I would advise you to find this out for yourself, by joining match.com in Greensboro (27410) or Charlotte (28210) and creating a profile of your own. That are precious few never been married, educated, no kids, singles in these areas, so set your profile up like that. I do not know what you look like in person- if you are a legit good looking guy post your own pictures, if not post someone else's or you will not be able to see what I am talking about. Do this for a month, and most important keep an eye out for the things I mentioned- Generic info., no specific town info, no heights or other profile preferences filled out. Let me know what happens. You have to experience it for yourself. Happy Easter

[Sam Moorcroft, ChristianCafe.com]

Thanks, but I'll have to pass on the account process - don't think my wife would appreciate it, even if I said it was for "research" purposes :)

As to whether Match is doing what you are suggesting or not, there is a lawsuit against them on this very issue. I can't see it happening, but then again, as you correctly point out, I am not a member of Match, so have no first-hand experience.

And, while my expertise is on online dating in general, it is more specifically focussed on the Christian niche market, as that is what I do all day, and have done for over a dozen years now.

Happy Easter to you, too. He is Risen!

[dave]

I've talked to a few of the previous attorney's who have sued the Internet dating sites in the past, completely separate from the new suit. Not going to mention which ones because they were pretty incompetent. The previous cases were not nearly thorough enough, nor did they partake in the level of investigation done with the current suit. They also did not have any former match employees who have true knowledge of how they do business. Eharmony is even worse than match.com. They do not list "last active dates" for their profiles which gives them the license to screw over a paying member by sending them matches who may not have been active for months to years.

Someone should find a way to take all these people on match and eharmony, and just organize speed dating events all over the country. This way you can see who is real and who isn't in person without all the bs.

[Sam Moorcroft, ChristianCafe.com]

Dave, something we don't understand, as we've been doing this since inception: we show you the last on date of all members. And, we auto-archive all members once they hit the 120 day mark of last activity (unless they are paying, in which case they can have a date past 120 days - those ones we go after via email to try and get them to come back. Fortunately, these are rare cases, as why pay for something you aren't using?).

We have never hidden our members' activity, nor how many new people are registering profiles daily (in real-time), nor how many are online at any given time (in real-time, also, not some made up number based on a 12, 24, 36, or 72 hour time scale, as so many other dating sites seem to use).

We don't have to hide all these things, as we have a great site that people consistently visit, create profiles, use, and pay. Our belief has always been to operate above-board, a) because it is the right thing to do and b) because the more transparent you are, the more your members trust you. Trusting members are more apt to pay you. So, it is simple business sense.

We are the *only* site that we know of that does all of the above. We are also the *only* site that lets all trial members have virtually the same access as paying subscribers, during their free trial period (7-10 days). We have some restrictions, but they are few and are more about blocking scammers than anything else.

So, while I can't speak for Match or eHarmony or even our direct competition, I can say that none of them operate the way we do. We are into our 13th year for a reason. A good reason.

[Dave]

Quite obviously, none of them apparently operate like yours do. You don't create fake profiles, you have full disclosure, and appear to operate your business with the highest of integrity. Unfortunately, in the on-line dating business, this is the exception, and not the norm. The thing is, the conception out there is that any lawsuit against an Internet dating company is from some fat, unattractive guy who is simply disgruntled that he could not get a date. My reality is that I have been told I am a good looking guy by many different women, have gone on dates with several hundred attractive women, yet still also have been a victim of fraud by match.com and eharmony.

[JB]

I believe Dave.Like he said,in mass populated areas like mine in Chicago,NY,LA etc... there's enough people that most everything runs on auto pilot.

I've often wondered how things work out the "rural" areas where there's very little or no population like Po Dunk,Wisconsin or the places he's talking about because obviously there's not going to be that many "new" REAL people joining everyday so anything "fishy" like he's talking about ie: profiles with the same generic info, quality attractive photo's etc.... are easy to spot by guys like him and myself that have been doing this for years.He said he caught them and they took the profiles down and I believe him.I guess what we all myself included find hard to believe is that Match or any other site would be saying to themselves "we really need more paying members in _________(fill in the blank with your sparsely populated town)let's put up some fake beautiful people profiles to lure more subscribers??But I guess someone must if you caught it.By the way,why don't you take a picture of one of those"generic's"and email them to Mark so he can post it for all to see like the guy did with terrible looking new Match headline that's in smaller fonts than the profile(which still looks ridiculous btw)

Obviously Sam over at ChristianCafe isn't going to do anything deceptive because he's CHRISTIAN !!!....LOL But how will the paying public ever trust the integrity of any of these other sites??The answer is simply we'll never be able to 100% but Match knows they basically have a monopoly(the most high quality profiles) and the bottom line is I HAVE to be on the site where I have the best chance to succeed and in my area it's Match/POF for better or worse. But I do understand now Dave.I'd hate to live in a sparsely populated area and do internet dating.It's got to suck even worse than here...lol)

[Dave]

Forget about me busting people, it's just simple common sense. If one is single, educated, divorced(or never married), and doesn't have any kids, and is looking for the same in a partner, it does not take long at all to figure out that young professionals walking around (where I live) with these traits are extremely rare. That said, it puts a premium on connecting with those few. So commmon sense, if I am a legit customer paying 34 bucks a month and have the above traits, and I spot one of those few who DOES seem to have the traits I want in a partner, I'm going to connect with that person and make the effort. If I spend 15 minutes to write a thoughtful initial e-mail, and the e-mails remain positive, quite obviously I'm going to at least talk to that person on the phone. SO...... again taking in all the information and how rare finding someone with certain traits that I want is, if again I was a legit paying customer, and legitimately lived in the town, why on Earth would I initiate an e-mail, take the time to go back and forth, and then all of a sudden cut off contact for no reason, yet still remain on-line with an active profile? Again, this isn't Chicago, or Atlanta, or New York City, where a person may have several hundred other options that fit her, I'm talking about in a small town where the pickings are slim. There really is no other conclusion to come to other than that this person was created by the company to keep you interested in the site, and eventually when you get blown off, they just expect you to move on and not be suspicious of it or catch on. However, if you've been doing it as long as I have, yes you do catch on.

[Dave]

Just to update you Sam, I've removed over 9000 profiles I haven't been interested in where I live, and that is with a wide range of criteria and 50 miles out. I had a grand total of SIX new profiles today, and FOUR yesterday, so this 20,000 number a day is non-existent where I live in Greensboro, North Carolina and 50 miles out

[Sam Moorcroft, ChristianCafe.com]

Of course the 20,000 daily isn't from your area; it isn't from *any* one area. The 20,000 is an aggregate of all daily new profiles, including the 6 new ones in your area:-)

That being said, I don't know what the true figure is. It could be 30,000. Or, 15,000. But, it is sizeable, given Match's overall size.

As for you removing "over 9,000 profiles" and those 350 women you've met (plus "at least 500 others who cut off contact" with you) - it kinda begs the question: aren't you being a tad picky (just a tad)?;) I mean, come on, man! You can't find one woman right for you after going through hundreds?

Perhaps they aren't the problem, hmmm? Seriously, something to think about.