LeanSpa built fake news sites to sell açaí — and 'free trials' that billed $80 a month

LeanSpa's marketers built a network of fake news websites — pages styled like local journalism — to push acai berry and 'colon cleanse' weight-loss supplements as miracle products. The hook was a 'free trial' for a nominal shipping fee. What arrived instead was a $79.95 charge, and then recurring monthly billing.

The FTC and the State of Connecticut sued in December 2011 and shut the operation down; the settlement was announced on 7 January 2014 inside 'Operation Failed Resolution', the same sweep as Sensa and L'Occitane. The settling defendants surrendered roughly $7.3 million in assets against a judgment totalling more than $32 million, most of it suspended, and were permanently barred from negative-option billing, misrepresenting trials or news reports, and rapid-weight-loss claims.

In September 2014 the FTC mailed more than 400,000 claim forms to possible victims. The case became the Commission's reference for a pattern it has hunted ever since: the fake news site as ad placement, and the 'free trial' as the opening line of a recurring bill.