June 20, 2016

Florida and the Federal Trade Commission announced a settlement with Vast Tech Support, LLC, its owner, founder, and Chief Operating Officer Mark Donohue and OMG Tech Support, LLC. In November 2014, Attorney General Bondi’s Office and the FTC filed a complaint against Vast Tech Support, Donohue, OMG Tech Help and the companies’ principals and related entities for deceptively marketing computer software and tech support services. The Vast Tech Support and OMG Tech Support defendants agreed to a judgment of more than $27 million and to surrender all assets to the court-appointed receiver, who will liquidate the assets and wind down the companies. Vast Tech Support advertised a registry software product, PC HealthBoost, claiming the product could dramatically increase computer speed and protect from errors, crashes and freezes. After consumers downloaded a free version of the software, a system scan allegedly misled consumers to believe that their computer had hundreds or thousands of errors in need of repair, regardless of whether the computer had any performance issues. Another defendant in this matter, Boost Software, urged consumers to pay $29.97 for the registered version of PC HealthBoost to fix the non-existent errors. FL