Looking For Love in All the Wrong Places

In this busy world we live in, many have gone to online services to try and be matched up with their perfect mate. It looks like some of those matches were made neither in heaven, nor in cyberspace:

It's not easy finding love in cyberspace, and now some frustrated online daters say they were victims of fraud by two top Internet matchmaking services and have taken their complaints to court.

Match.com, a unit of IAC/Interactive Corp., is accused in a federal lawsuit of goading members into renewing their subscriptions through bogus romantic e-mails sent out by company employees. In some instances, the suit contends, people on the Match payroll even went on sham dates with subscribers as a marketing ploy.
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In a separate suit, Yahoo Inc.'s personals service is accused of posting profiles of fictitious potential dating partners on its Web site to make it look as though many more singles subscribe to the service than actually do.

And how did this alleged scheme come to light?

The Match lawsuit was filed earlier this month in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles by plaintiff Matthew Evans, who contends he went out with a woman he met through the site who turned out to be nothing more than "date bait" working for the company.

The relationship went nowhere, according to his suit. Evans says Match set up the date for him because it wanted to keep him from pulling the plug on his subscription and was hoping he'd tell other potential members about the attractive woman he met through the service, according to Leviant.

His lawyers said Evans, of Orange County, California, was not available to comment, but described him as a working professional in his 30s.

Leviant said his client found out about the alleged scam after the woman he dated confessed she was employed by Match.

I didn't know that Match.com was also running an escort service. Makes me very glad that I'm not in that meat market, thanks to an 18 year marriage (which is going quite well, thank you).

Of course, this whole thing could just be sour grapes on the part of a guy who didn't make the grade with this particular woman. Who knows? I guess the courts will have to figure that out.