United States of America: Adopted FTC order enforcing content-related measures

On 13 October 2021, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) sent out a Notice of Penalty Offense to over 700 companies in the US. Through such notices, the FTC is informing companies how deceiving consumers through the use of endorsements will be punished. Specifically, fake reviews and other misleading endorsements will lead to civil fines of up to $43,792 per violation. The notice was sent out after the FTC detected a variety of practices, namely false claims of endorsement by a third party, using an endorsement to make deceptive performance claims and misrepresenting that the experience of endorsers represents consumers’ typical or ordinary experience.