14 DAY TRIAL // Tagged.com finds itself in even more legal trouble after two California residents have sued the social network for allegedly tricking them into sharing their email contacts and using those contacts for false advertising. Miriam Slater of Santa Barbara and Sara Golden of Los Angeles who filed the suit are seeking class-action status and are claiming the site violated several US laws like the Stored Communications Act and Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.
Tagged is a San Francisco-based social network that used tactics that some found misleading for gaining more users. As a new user would sign up for the product they would be required to fill in their email and the password to the email account. By signing up they also allowed the company to retrieve their email contacts and use their account to send out invites to all of them making them look like they were from the users themselves and not an automated message.
Last month, New York State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo threatened to start legal proceedings against the company saying it “stole the address books and identities of millions of people.” He also said that as much as 60 million emails of this type had been sent by the company over time and was looking to block it from engaging in similar behavior while also seeking a fine.
In this latest suit Slate claims that she gave the site her email address and password in order to view the photos mentioned in the email she first received. She had no intention or knowledge of the fact that she was in fact signing up for the site or that her contacts would be sent emails on her behalf. Golden said she also joined the site after receiving an invitation coming from Slate. Tagged didn't comment on the new lawsuit but had recently acknowledged that the tactics were confusing some users and has since stopped sending this kind of invitations.