Arbitration and the American Bar Association’s One-Sided Webinar

by Jeff Sovern The American Bar Association's Business Law Section Consumer Financial Services Committee held a webinar earlier today in which the topic was listed as "The CFPB Begins Arbitration Rulemaking, But Its Own Study Shows that Arbitration Benefits Consumers." The sole speakers, other than the moderator, were Ballard Spahr's Alan Kaplinsky and Mark Levin. […]

FCC imposes large fine for robocalls

The Federal Communications Commission announced a $2.96 million fine against Travel Club Marketing, Inc., related companies, and the companies’ owner, for making at least 185 unsolicited robocalls. The calls were prerecorded advertising calls to consumers who had not consented to the robocalls; the majority of the consumers had listed their telephone number on the national […]

FTC charges data brokers with helping to scam $7 million from consumers

The Federal Trade Commission announced today: The Federal Trade Commission has charged a data broker operation with illegally selling payday loan applicants’ financial information to a scam operation that took millions of dollars from consumers by debiting their bank accounts and charging their credit cards without their consent. According to the FTC’s complaint, the data […]

NY City bank-disclosure law struck down

A federal judge on Friday struck down New York City’s Responsible Banking Act, holding the city preempted by state and federal banking laws. The ordinance required deposit banks to disclose information about how the banks serve low-income neighborhoods. Under the ordinance, the information would be published and factor into whether banks would remain eligible to hold […]

Rates of people lacking health insurance continue to drop in most states

Read this analysis by Gallup. Not surprisingly, the uninsured rates are dropping in states that opted for the Affordable Care Act's Medicaid expansion. Perhaps more surprising is that states that have set up their own health-care exchanges (or have state-federal partnerships), as opposed to states that depend on the federal exchange, generally are the states […]

“FTC to Clarify Its Powers to Police Unfair Competition”

The Wall Street Journal reports: The Federal Trade Commission in its 100-year history has never agreed on formal principles for policing companies engaged in “unfair” competition. That looks set to change. Members of the FTC are close to a bipartisan agreement to lay out for the first time how the commission views its authority to […]

“Why the FTC is showing up at hackers’ biggest conferences”

…is the title of this eye-opening piece in the Washington Post about what the FTC is seeking to learn from hackers about data privacy. As the Post reports, FTC Commissioner Terrell McSweeny and the agency's chief technologist Ashkan Soltani are in Las Vegas this week to talk with hackers and security researchers attending the Black Hat […]

“Coca-Cola Funds Scientists Who Shift Blame for Obesity Away From Bad Diets”

That's the title of this article in yesterday's NY Times by Anahad O'Connor. Coke is the world's largest marketer of sugary drinks. O'Connor explains that Coke gives "financial and logistical support" for "a new nonprofit organization called the Global Energy Balance Network." (The group's name — The Global Energy Balance Network — is more inscrutable […]