The TIW Blog

It turns out that some of the biggest brands are not exactly as trustworthy as some may have thought. Customers are not pleased.

From the article:

A U.S. Senate report has revealed that retailers (a number of which you may already know and trust), have accepted as much as $792 million to share customers’ credit-card information with direct marketing companies. Could your card number have been one that was shared? Would you have known?

The companies engaging in such practices have been getting away with it because of terms buried in fine print, where customers accept offers without having to share their credit card info themselves, placing a certain level of trust in the retailers that are profiting off of sharing their info.

Here are just a few of the biggest ones involved in profiting from their customers’ information:

- 1-800-Flowers.com
- Buy.com
- Classmates.com
- Columbia House
- Confi-Check
- Expedia/Hotels.com
- Fandango
- FTD
- Hotwire
- InQ
- Intellius
- MovieTickets.com
- Orbitz
- Priceline
- Redcats USA
- Shutterfly
- Travelocity
- US Airways
- VistaPrint
- Yahoo
- Avon
- Barnes & Noble
- eHarmony
- Half.com
- Pizza Hut
- TimeLife and
- Victoria’s Secret

Click HERE to read more.

For the offending brands themselves, this has to be a PR and online reputation management nightmare. Read the whole report here (pdf) if you’ve got some time on your hands.