Ashley Madison Admits It Lured Customers With 70,000 Fake 'Fembots' (arstechnica.com) 92
America's Federal Trade Commission is now investigating the "infidelity hookup site" Ashley Madison. In a possibly-related development, an anonymous reader writes:
Ashley Madison's new executive team "admits that it used fembots to lure men into paying to join the site," reports Arts Technica. More than 75% of the site's customers were convinced to join by an army of 70,000 fembot accounts, "created in dozens of languages by data entry workers...told to populate these accounts with fake information and real photos posted by women who had shut down their accounts on Ashley Madison or other properties owned by Ashley Madison's parent company, Avid Life Media... In reality, that lady was a few lines of PHP... In internal company e-mails, executives discussed openly that only about five percent of the site's members were real females."
The company only abandoned the practice in 2015, and CNN also reports that for years, if the site's male customers complained, Ashley Madison "threatened to send paperwork to users' homes if they disputed their bills -- potentially revealing cheaters to their spouses," while one user complained that the site also automatically signed up customers for recurring billing. "We are not threatening you. We are laying the facts to you..." one e-mail read, while another warned that "We do fight all charge backs."
The company only abandoned the practice in 2015, and CNN also reports that for years, if the site's male customers complained, Ashley Madison "threatened to send paperwork to users' homes if they disputed their bills -- potentially revealing cheaters to their spouses," while one user complained that the site also automatically signed up customers for recurring billing. "We are not threatening you. We are laying the facts to you..." one e-mail read, while another warned that "We do fight all charge backs."
This is unacceptable (Score:5, Funny)
I was promised real fembots!
Re: (Score:2)
Or $50 on Amazon.
https://www.amazon.com/Trendma... [amazon.com]
Fraud on a massive scale (Score:4, Insightful)
So, they are all in jail, right?
Re:Fraud on a massive scale (Score:4, Funny)
Re: Fraud on a massive scale (Score:2, Insightful)
The execs still have money, so no.
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Yep, all 70K fembots are in jail. Well, they were archived in .zip files so it's basically the same thing for them.
A few lines of PHP wouldn't turn me on (Score:5, Funny)
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It is actually quite fun being chatted up by a fembot. It is funny how they all say the same things, and how often the apparently live up the road.
Re:A few lines of PHP wouldn't turn me on (Score:5, Funny)
I used to be a really big stickler for type safety... but these PHP bots are just so dynamic, and just between you and me, they let you get to root so much more quickly. I feel like with some of them, you barely have to go five minutes before she's almost begging you to inject your SQL.
Who knew... (Score:1)
Re:Who knew... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Who knew... (Score:5, Funny)
I don't remember any blow jobs, but it's sure fucked me plenty of times.
No, no, no. That's Javascript.
Re: Who knew... (Score:2)
I prefer being fucked by Ruby.
Re: (Score:2)
Ruby the Red-Nosed Boss?
Re: (Score:2)
I don't know, it might be bash. From a bash prompt:
$ %blow
bash: fg: %blow: no such job
Re: Who knew... (Score:2)
But you knew it sucked right?
Re: (Score:2)
What did they expect? If they weren't cheating and lying to their spouses, they could of just said, "OK, go ahead. Send paper work to my house."
But I don't suppose that Ashley Madison would have allowed it to be as simply solved as that.
Re: (Score:3)
While the victims are not innocent. They were tricked into it. Much like in entrapment (An illegal activity in the US where law enforcement tries to pressure someone into breaking a law so they can bust them). So for some of these people they mad had been going threw some hard times and those bots seemed to fill whatever void that were looking for, thinking it was a real person.
Most people after making a long term commitment have a tendency to reflect if life was better if I did X differently. Then there
Re: (Score:2)
That's not entrapment. They already signed up on a website for cheating spouses. There's clear intent to participate. While the ultimate decision to go ahead with the action in a particular circumstance is up in the air, that's outside the bounds of entrapment.
For this to be entrapment AM would have needed to send someone to specifically solicit an individual to cheat out of the blue. e.g. hired girl approaches married target out of the blue and a asks him to sleep with her. THAT'S entrapment.
Guy goes
The BOFH is strong in this one (Score:2)
Not only did he replace the users with a very small shell script, but the clients too. One more round to write manbots and he can partner to release The Sims: The Dating Simulator.
What they don't realize is... (Score:1)
There are now 70000 very happy manbots.
How surprising! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:How surprising! (Score:5, Insightful)
An infidelity site is run by lying and cheating scumbags? Who could have predicted that?
I can't believe someone would lie on the internet, especially about sex and double-especially if it involved money.
Re: (Score:2)
I expect for many of the "clients" they were looking for the illusion that they were more attractive than they really were. Being they were looking for the illusion they were willing to set aside belief.
Biologically men are more wired to seek out many partners, while woman tend to focus on one person. But sex drive makes us do stupid things.
Still not bankrupt?! (Score:5, Insightful)
The most surprising thing is that this site is still in business - apparently many people (presumably mostly men) care about getting laid more than about anything else.
Almost a year ago, a massive data breach put all the details of would-be cheaters out in the open. Result: lots of publicity, and an increase in membership numbers.
The same file, upon analyses, showed very few women on the site. Still, people continued to join the site.
The suspicion of using bots I heard about back then already, where new registered people would start to receive inviting messages from women the moment they signed up, but to read them or reply or whatever they had to start paying for the site. Yet, membership continued to rise.
It must be a pretty sad bunch that signs up for that site. No wonder the real girls stay clear of it.
Re: (Score:1)
Interestingly enough, that is also true on Match.com. I refused to pay but i get a continual set of responses and what not. I think sites like match.com are highly manipulative.
Re:Still not bankrupt?! (Score:5, Interesting)
Are they any dating sites that don't do the same thing?
The reality of dating web sites is that all the pictures of women are real, but the profiles are fake, and all the profiles of men are real, but the pictures are fake.
Re:Still not bankrupt?! (Score:5, Funny)
I think sites like match.com are highly manipulative.
You ain't seen nothing yet. Wait until you meet a real women.
Re: (Score:2)
Almost a year ago, a massive data breach put all the details of would-be cheaters out in the open. Result: lots of publicity, and an increase in membership numbers.
Step 1: "hack" your own site
Step 2: dox your own customer base
Step 3: ???
Step 4: Profit!
Re: (Score:3)
It's a great scam because no one is willing to sue them fit lying, ripping them off it leaking their data.
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apparently many people (presumably mostly men) care about getting laid more than about anything else.
No, they care more about having the fantasy they'll get laid, but have clearly accepted they never will.
Not just getting laid (Score:3)
Oh, and lots of people never learn to be cynical. It's a weird thought when you're a nerd because you learn cynicism at an early age when you're peers turn on you because when your better grades get you praise from teacher but you can't run as fast on the playground.
Turing didn't consider the penis (Score:1)
Y'all know the Turing test.
But Turing didn't apparently consider that there's a substantial lowering of the bar when the validity of the test is based upon a man thinking with his dick.
Where did they get this idea from? (Score:1)
I know, "Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels"
Listen to this one then; you open a company called the Arse Tickler's Faggot Fan Club. You take an advert in the back page of some gay mag, advertising the latest in arse-intruding dildos, sell it a bit with, er... I dunno, "does what no other dildo can do until now", latest and greatest in sexual technology. Guaranteed results or money back, all that bollocks. These dills cost twenty-five each; a snip for all the pleasure they are going to give the recipients. T
OMG, passed the Turing test! (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
The few lines of PHP may have passed the Turing test, but the guys they're talking to didn't.
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When my friends ask me if we'll ever have true AI, I tell them to look at people such as these. And my friends realize that a lot of human intelligence is artificial.
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You're confusing the Turing test with the "would fuck that" test. The bar is much, much lower.
Re: (Score:2)
I saw Ashley Madison should borrow the code base from Microsoft Tay, except teach it to be sexist against men...
Suspicion (Score:3)
This is old news (Score:5, Interesting)
I had a friend who worked at Webcapades, the company behind Eroticy, an adult friend finder competitor. The tech they had for collecting Personal information and using it to fake personal communications was incredible. Over time they would collect names of pets, family members, etc, and this data would go into a database.
My friends job, as a 'community manager' was to maintain 50+ profiles of fake people. A fair chunk of their time was spent choosing a profile, selecting a huge list of people that profile had ever interacted with, and then writing a mass email. Based on the users selected, the message tool would list what data tokens were available for all the selected users. As my friend crafted the mail blast, they would insert tokens that would be replaced with personal information tailored to each recipient. This was in 2003, so you can imagine how much more advanced the tech for faking profiles has gotten.
So, let me get this straight... (Score:2)
Go to a pimp, give the pimp your name, your address, your personal preferences, and your money. Then threaten to take your money away, or to stop providing more. Did someone think that this was all an altruistic venture? Wanna tell me how the sex trade is any different no matter where it is? Was someone expecting a pimp to be above-board, honest, ethical?
Welcome to the sex trade. It has always gone hand-in-hand with the drug trade. Are you ready for legalized illicit drugs? Here's the first thing tha
Re: (Score:2)
This is more like going to a pimp who turns out to be an undercover cop, giving him your personal information and money, and finding out the cop is corrupt when he shakes you down for more money or he'll arrest you.
There is no actual sex trade involved.
Most dating web sites won't actually allow women to sign up, because real women interferes with the scam.
Re: (Score:3)
In some places sex workers are completely legal, being unionized and having political representation. IMHO that is what to strive for - why make one kind of service so different to all other services that are provided? [Well the answer are Christians, "protectors of morality" and "protectors of women" - even though a huge portion of sex workers are men and the morality of not allowing sex services are iffy at best]
Now forcing people to sell sex in any way should have serious consequences, treating each forc
Legalized Illicit Drugs... (Score:2)
synonyms: illegal, unlawful, illegitimate, criminal, felonious;
So what's the second thing that us ignorant peons get to learn? Besides Engrish.
Re: (Score:2)
So what's the second thing that us ignorant peons get to learn? Besides Engrish.
The pedants are revolting?
Re: (Score:2)
You get to learn the difference between verbs and adjectives. "Illicit" is was the adjective, it modified the noun "drugs". The "drugs" are "illicit". "Legalized" was the verb, it modified the subject "illicit drugs". "Legalizing illicit drugs" is what is happening with weed right now. It would make no sense to legalize legal drugs, as they are already legal. The lesson to learn here is that of sequential causality. The drugs exist, they are illicit, and they are to be legalized. Once they have been
Where is Peter Thiel's lawyer? (Score:2)
Isn't that simple? (Score:2)
OK, there's no sympathy for anyone running (or using) such a site, but wouldn't that be classified as fraud?
False advertising? (Score:3, Insightful)
Shouldn't the FCC (or other government-run agency) shut down this site for blatant false advertising?
No dating/hookup sits should have fembots or fake profiles just to lure men in. Every profile should have a real, paying person behind it. Period. Anything else is simply false advertisement.
Re: (Score:3)
That would be the FTC, the group nominally oriented towards making sure business practices are legitimate.
Ideally the FTC would have a much larger and more vigorous enforcement arm whose job it was to audit and punish firms suspected of fraudulent business practices.
Dating sites would be just one more business category where they could audit for suspicious business practices such as fake profiles, phony gender ratios, and dishonest success rates.
It's always bothered me that both American society at large an