Somehow I have started receiving e-mails from something called Newsmax a few months ago. Masquerading as news, the e-mails were largely biased comments on economics and politics with an ultraconservative slant.in October, I received an advertising e-mail offering to send a copy of a book by Milton Friedman "free", with only a $4.95 shipping and handling charge. Out of interest in Mr. Friedman, I accepted that offer, using my debit card, and thought no more about it. The book never arrived. But on Jan. 10, $49 was taken out of my checking account, supposedly with my debit card, and no identification of who had taken it out except a different company and a different phone number. Only after spending a half-hour at the bank trying to reverse that charge and the bank's service charge, did I discover that there was a company in Florida (no address given) that claimed that I had taken the book only on a two-month trial and they could obtain the price of the book (which I never received so could not "try" at all) after the two months. So I lost at least $50 in billable time, never got the book, and never recovered the $4.95. And because of the anonymity of the Internet I cannot locate the perpetrators of this false advertising scam.
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