Content and Service Providers: Equally Guilty
USA Today reported on the growing trend of unscrupulous content providers taking advantage of children:
…the most common complaints involve situations where kids are duped into doing something that activates a subscription without knowing they've signed up for a monthly bill.
Apparently, it's gotten so bad over there that several people have filed lawsuits. It's an old game actually. Many unscrupulous content providers lure people to incur monthly bills with misleading ads or free offers.
But this problem wouldn't exist in the first place if service providers took stringent steps to make sure their partners were on the level. The usual arrangement is that they help content providers market their services, and do their thing. Not to mention make use of the cellular network itself. In exchange for a share of the profits.
Even if it's lucrative to let content providers dupe people into paying, it's a short-term gain with long-term effects. Because when customers discover they've been fooled, their anger will know no bounds. Service providers are in a great position to keep dishonest content providers at bay, by only working with partners who act ethically.
