It was reported last week that an online dating company JDI Dating Limited was penalized by the US Federal Trade Commission for scamming its customers. Basically, they hit new customers with fake prospective dates, to get them to sign up for the paid service. Pretty sleazy, but maybe a useful lesson for some of the customers.
It seems obvious why dating services are both a happy hunting ground for operators and evoke such revulsion when they use “perfectly normal” Internet business practices. By design, dating sites exploit the emotional weaknesses of their users, and deceptive practices are a betrayal and just plain icky.
Unlike OKCupid and Facebook, who I have criticized for conducting “research” without permission on their users, this is much more Amazonian: they are just plain cheating the users, because they can.
Yes, this is how the Internet conducts business. No, it is not OK.
Robert McGrath's Blog 