Lawsuit in Victoria against Google over false reviews for artifical plant company

The Age newspaper has this story regarding false reviews of an artificial patents business, that alleged were posted when the business had a dispute with a moving company.

See https://amp.theage.com.au/national/victoria/david-and-georgina-had-a-dispute-with-their-removalists-four-years-later-they-ve-taken-google-to-court-20220707-p5azub.html

Interestingly, they are suing Google.

Similar story to the Titan Sheds dispute that ended up in the Federal Court in Brisbane a few years back.  There are about 3 court decisions.  One involved trying to get evidence from Google, but because Google was offshore, this was difficult.  See Note

Movember Fund Raiser

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Google Search Results Misleading

"In the Statement of Claim, the applicant alleges that, in the period from at least early April 2011 to 21 June 2011, the first respondent established a process by which searches for the applicant’s website by reference to the words “Pacific Boating” on the internet using the Google search engine were diverted to websites controlled by or associated with the first respondent."

See Pacific Boating Group Pty Ltd v Freedom Boating Club Pty Ltd [2012] FCA 72 (8 February 2012)

Marketing Issues with Social Media

ADVERTISING: When the Marketing Reach of Social Media Backfires  What happens when behavior on social media is deemed antisocial?  Full story here.

Fake Consumer Reviews

On the consumer protection front, the FTC settled charges that a public relations agency engaged in deceptive advertising “by having employees pose as ordinary consumers posting game reviews at the online iTunes store, and not disclosing that the reviews came from paid employees working on behalf of the developers. This activity was in violation of the FTC's Revised Endorsement Guidelines which require disclosure. The PR firm, Reverb Communications, is required to take down the fraudulent postings and bars them from making similar postings in the future without appropriate disclosures.

Press release: http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2010/08/reverb.shtm

Links to Complaint and Consent Order: http://www.ftc.gov/os/caselist/0923199/index.shtm

Information on the FTC's Revised Endorsement Guidelines (16 CFR Part 255): http://ftc.gov/multimedia/video/business/endorsement-guides.shtm

Meta-tags and Google Keywords - TM infringement

A recent Queensland case concerning trademark infringement issues, relating to Internet marketing. The case considers Google AdWords keywords, meta-tags and domain names in the context of trademark infringement.

See Mantra Group v. Tailly Pty Ltd

Tailly operated businesses under names such as "Circle on Cavill Private Apartments" and "A1 Gold Coast Holidays". Tailly went into bankruptcy last Thursday.

See also:

• Mallesons Note
• Gold Coast Bulletin