Compliance & Ethics

RentGrow to Pay $2.25 Million Over Tenant Screening Reports That Allegedly Multiplied Criminal & Eviction Records

RentGrow will pay $2.25 million to settle federal allegations that its tenant screening reports included duplicate criminal and eviction records, potentially making some applicants appear to have more extensive histories than they did, the Federal Trade Commission announced Wednesday.

France's Market Regulator Finds AML Weaknesses That Still Reach the Foundations of Compliance

The French Autorité des Marchés Financiers' latest review of anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing controls, published as part of the regulator's 2026 supervisory priorities and its broader Impact 2027 strategy, distills what inspectors found across 46 examinations that resulted in regulatory follow-up between January 1, 2022, and December 31, 2025. Those inspections produced 16 sanction decisions, 16 administrative settlement agreements, and 16 follow-up letters requiring firms to remedy deficiencies, with some inspections leading to more than one form of regulatory action.

Virgin Media Fined Record £28 Million After Ofcom Finds Systematic Barriers to Customer Cancellations

Britain's communications regulator has fined Virgin Media £28 million after finding the company repeatedly subjected customers to unreasonable effort and unnecessary difficulty when they tried to cancel their contracts and switch to another provider. The penalty, announced Wednesday, is the largest Ofcom has ever imposed under its consumer protection rules for direct harm to consumers.

France Orders Meta to Return to the Negotiating Table Over News Payments

In interim measures published Wednesday, the Autorité de la concurrence ordered the Meta to resume talks with two organizations representing French press agencies and publishers after concluding that Meta's conduct may amount to an abuse of a dominant position. The regulator also directed the company to provide, within 15 days, the information that publishers say they need to judge whether Meta's payment offers bear any relationship to the value of the journalism appearing on its services.

EU Moves to Standardize Anti-Money Laundering Enforcement

On Wednesday, AMLA published draft regulatory technical standards that would establish, for the first time, a common methodology for supervisors across the European Union when enforcing breaches of anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing rules. The proposal is less about creating tougher enforcement than creating more consistent enforcement. If two organizations commit the same breach under the same circumstances, supervisors should begin from the same framework and, absent meaningful differences in the facts, arrive at comparable outcomes.

JustAnswer Ordered to Pay $6.5 Million After Australian Court Finds Consumers Were Misled

For nearly three years, Australians arriving at JustAnswer's website were greeted with what looked like a straightforward proposition. An automated chat promised access to expert advice for $1.30 (AUD $2), a small, refundable payment that suggested a single transaction rather than the beginning of an ongoing relationship. It was only later, often after money had already left their accounts, that many consumers discovered they had signed up for recurring monthly subscriptions costing between $29 and $49 (AUD $45 and AUD $75).

FTC Sharpens ‘Made in the USA’ Enforcement With New Warning Letters

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission on Monday issued warning letters to eight companies whose advertising appears to overstate where their products were made. Seven companies were told their products may have been falsely marketed as "Made in the USA," while another received a warning over products advertised as "Made in Texas," despite indications they were imported, either entirely or in significant part.