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The Scam Continues - African Mango?


So now its African Mango and Colon Cleansing... new name, same old dirty tricks. So I was on Facebook this morning and saw an ad for incredible effortless weight loss. I follow this ad, of course, to see where it goes. FB is usually pretty good at not letting this kind of garbage through. Maybe they have a new person approving ads that doesn't know what a scam looks like. This isn't quite as awesome as the product I saw advertised on FB a couple weeks ago- a spring that you're supposed to push on with your chin to keep your neck from looking fat. It still keeps the form of diets scams though, and that's what we're out to destroy.

Here's how to spot this bologna if you run across it:

  1. It looks like a news station site but isn't. This one calls itself news health 6. You can find it at newshealthalerts .com /reports/mango1.php. (Without the spaces) This is not me advising you to go there, just saying if you want to see it all for yourself.
  2. If you click on any other tab in their fake site (presumably to check out their other "news") you get a pop-up trying to get you to try this supplement package. That's objective reporting right?
  3. After doing a little digging... typing the name "Julie Ayers" into Google (the fake reporter's name shown in the header) only to find that apparently that same fictional "reporter" was involved in promoting acai berry scams.
  4. A handy site called Zimbio had a lucky screen-capture of one of those old Acai Berry scam sites. (That old site screenshot is shown on the left. On the right is my browser window with the site I've been telling you about) Funny how the headline, the layout, even the text is almost exactly the same, no?

    African Mango?
  5. I was a little horrified to see that it has 1,741 fans, but then I thought, hey, wait a minute... everything else on this site is fake... So I asked our IT guy to look through the source code and apparently the Like button is not a legitimate FB button. That's right, the button itself seems to be spoofing the Facebook Like button. So who knows what happens when you hit that? :O
  6. So what else is fake... hmm. How about the reporter pictured by the column itself? Yeah, she's a stock photo, but to her credit, she's an expensive one. 10 credits, wow! Just a tip for the scammers: consider buying the rights to the photos you use so they get taken off the stock photo sites. Even Jenny's Diet blog failed to do that. This one (as you can see below is straight off istockphoto)

    Fake reporter Fake reporter
  7. So our fake news anchor (pictured above) also goes along to give a full testimonial about her trial of the product, complete with links and responses to what are supposedly genuine glowing customer reviews. It's pretty hilarious that the site comments lists (10 out of 177) responses but there is no way to access the other supposed 167 comments. It also says the offer expires on Friday March 4. Want to bet that changes tomorrow (Friday)? I bet Diane (top on the comments list) might have her comment's post date change from what it says now: Wednesday March 2nd. I'll update you tomorrow!
  8. The imbedded links for African Mango go straight to an old Acai berry page. Hahaha, even if you use the link to buy it, it still takes you to Acai. Looks like someone's offer got pulled. See in this industry, if a company pushing a product doesn't pay their bill, they just swap the links to another offer.
  9. This site features symbols of major news agencies that impart trust, but it isn't affiliated with any of them (as you can see if you read the footer).
  10. The fat-to-thin pictures- who knows where they came from, of course I doubt they are real people associated with this product.
  11. The study they cite as a source from "Lipids in Health and Disease" does not give the actual article name.
    Here is what News Health 6 writes:

    "In a study published in the journal Lipids in Health& Disease, subjects taking African Mango lost an average of 12.3 pounds in 28 days without diet or exercise."

    If you go to the Lipids in Health and Disease site (I put the link below) and search for African Mango, you will get a weight-loss study that uses CQ (an African grape) and Irvingia gabonesis (African Mango). The study shows the CQ-IG group lost 4kg (8.81lbs.)in 4 weeks, a 3.2% loss in body fat, not the inflated 12.3 pounds in 28 days NH6 claims. Keep in mind they were also using CQ, which is not at all mentioned in the claim. Maybe someone wasn't so good with the metric system.
  12. Notice this sweet CYA move... They write "Here is what African Mango claimed on their website..." and "Here is what LeanSpa Cleanse claimed on their website..." So what this does is allow them to write blatantly inaccurate information as selling points and not take responsibility for it.
  13. Network reviews... what is this? Here are some quotes within the site:

"ABC News Calls African Mango A Superfood! Many world-class athletes have started using African mango products as part of their personal training regimen

- ABC News"

"Studies show that the african mango is one of the most nutritious foods in the world. African mango is packed with antioxidants, amino acids and essential fatty acids.

- MSNBC"

"CBS News notes that African Mango is 'rich in B vitamins, minerals, fiber, protein and omega-3 fatty acids. African mangoes also contain oleic acid.'

- CBS NEWS"

I can only guess why the site authors put this in here, maybe they were getting in trouble for misquoting celebrities so they moved to news networks? Since when does MSNBC have anything to say about a diet supplement? There is no reference to what programming these came from on any of these networks. I also find it funny how a network would quote itself in the 3rd person. Also funny that if you search for any of those quotes verbatim, there are no results. I've got one in response for this site:

The United States of America calls these scams predatory and morally bankrupt. People are catching on to these tired old lies, knock it off.

-The United States of America

Now all I have to do is put a disclaimer on the bottom and I can represent my views as those of an entire nation.

Speaking of disclaimers: after all this "evidence" that these products make you effortlessly lose large amounts of weight in a short span of time, this is in the footer:

"THIS WEBSITE IS ONLY ILLUSTRATIVE OF WHAT MIGHT BE ACHIEVABLE FROM USING THIS/THESE PRODUCTS, AND THAT THE STORY/COMMENTS DEPICTED ABOVE IS NOT TO BE TAKEN LITERALLY."

Really? So if it's not meant to be taken literally, how should we take it?

More fun with the footer: I remember how the Acai berry rebill scams worked so I actually clicked the Mango Terms and conditions and what do you know? It delivered me to an Acai Berry Terms and conditions page. Forgot to change your links huh? We'll pretend you're talking about African Mango, so you pay only $79.99 per bottle, including your trial supply? Here it is verbatim on the tryleanspa page I was sent to:

"YOUR PURCHASE OF THE PRODUCT THROUGH THIS WEBSITE CONSTITUTES ENROLLMENT IN THE LEANSPA PROPER WEIGHT LOSS SYSTEM MEMBERSHIP AND ADVANCE CONSENT TO MONTHLY PRODUCT SHIPMENTS AND CHARGES, AS DESCRIBED BELOW. AS DISCUSSED IN MORE DETAIL BELOW, YOU WILL BE LIABLE FOR PAYMENT, AT THE PRICE OF $79.99 PER BOTTLE, FOR ALL PRODUCT SHIPPED TO YOU, INCLUDING YOUR TRIAL SUPPLY AND ALL FUTURE SHIPMENTS, UNLESS YOU CANCEL YOUR ENROLLMENT AS SET FORTH BELOW."

Call me crazy, but wasn't a trial supply usually free? Here's more amusement:

"You will have a 14-day trial period (the 'Trial Period') to try our Product. The Trial Period will start after you place your order, and will end at 11:59 p.m. Eastern Standard Time on the 14th day. Upon shipment of your trial supply your credit card will be charged shipping and handling charges for your trial bottle."

The shipping terms estimates 3-5 business days to arrive. That leaves a little over a week to actually try the product and determine if you're satisfied.

Oh, this is precious:

"If you cancel but do not return the bottle, your credit card will be charged $79.99 for a 30-day supply (a second bottle will be shipped to you the day you are billed to complete your month supply)."

So even if you cancel within the 14 day period, if you don't return the bottle, you still get charged and sent more product you don't want? It even goes on to say that you have to get a special "RMA" number from them to write on your package, that returns aren't accepted without this number and you can only get this number by contacting them and hoping they respond.

I have three words for this: Dispute Your Charges

UPDATE!

So, I checked the site again today and now the offer expires on March 5th and the commenter "Diane" left her response on Thursday...not on Wednesday as we saw yesterday. Tomorrow, tomorrow, there's always tomorrow; it's always a day away!

Article referenced for this:

Disclaimer: UseYourBrainDiet.com does not speak on behalf of the United States of America.