Before the

Federal Trade Commission

Washington, DC 20580

In the Matter of 

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180solutions, Inc., and

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CJB.NET

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____________________________)

Complaint and Request for Investigation,

Injunction, and Other Relief

I. 

S

UMMARY

1. Over the past two years, the Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT) has worked

with advertising software developer 180solutions, Inc., to assist the company in

reforming distribution practices that appear to be unethical and illegal.  While

180solutions has undertaken some minor reforms as a result of those talks, unfair and

deceptive practices persist throughout much of the company s distribution network.  CDT

discovered through its investigations that 180solutions is engaging in a number of

deceptive and unfair practices to distribute its software through its affiliate, CJB.NET.

2. Users who sign up for free Web sites hosted by CJB.NET are not told in a clear and

conspicuous manner that visitors to their site will be prompted to download software.

This constitutes an unfair practice.  CJB.NET also uses a deceptive security warning

(ActiveX) prompt to dupe people into installing 180solutions' software, instead of

offering users the opportunity to give informed consent.  Following the ActiveX prompt,

the automatically triggered Web browser windows (pop ups) soliciting user consent

suggest that the site is  supported by advertising.   While most consumers understand a

site  supported by advertising  to mean a Web site that contains banner ads delivered by

the page, the  advertising  on a CJB.NET Web site actually involves a program that runs

continuously and tracks everything that the user does online.   As we document in this

complaint, the discrepancy between what users expect a Web site that is  supported by

advertising  to do and what CJB.NET hosted sites actually do are the root cause of

several types of unfair and deceptive trade practices.  CDT urges the Commission to

bring a complaint against 180solutions and CJB.NET for unfair and deceptive practices

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