MonsterHut, its CEO Todd Pelow and its CTO Gary Hartl, are
accused of fraudulently advertising and representing the company’s
e-mail marketing service as "permission based" or "opt-in," meaning
that every consumer to whom they send commercial e-mail has
explicitly asked to receive it.
The suit alleges that the company’s e-mail lists are only partly
"opt-in," and include many consumers who never asked to receive
e-mail from the company. The suit also alleges that this false
representation of MonsterHut’s business practices enabled the
company to profit through the deception its internet access
provider, its own paid advertisers, and consumers at large.
Since March 2001, according to the claim, MonsterHut has flooded
consumers’ e-mail in-boxes with more than 500 million commercial
e-mails, advertising a variety of goods and services. More than
750,000 consumers have requested to be removed from MonsterHut’s
mailing lists, and tens of thousands have complained to
MonsterHut’s ISP, PaeTec Communications, Inc.
Earlier this month, PaeTec cut MonsterHut from its network,
after a New York appeals court held that MonsterHut had violated an
anti-spamming provision in its contract with PaeTec. However,
nothing in that decision prevented MonsterHut from spamming
consumers through another ISP.
"We are seeking to prevent MonsterHut from continuing its
fraudulent, deceptive and illegal practices, not just over PaeTec’s
network, but over any ISP in New York," Spitzer said.
The Attorney General is seeking a court order to stop the
company and its officers from falsely representing the nature of
their spam; to require them to disclose how they obtained all the
consumers’ e-mail addresses; and to require them to pay civil
penalties and court costs for its violations of New York’s consumer
protection laws.
