Have You Stayed Current On Your Dishwasher-Loading Methods?

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We’ve long emphasized the importance of not pre-rinsing dishes for your newer dishwasher, since modern appliances now assume that you don’t. What else has changed since you first learned how to line up plates facing the water jets and place knives facing down in the basket? A surprising amount, actually.

The dishwasher experts down the hall from us at Consumer Reports know how to load the appliances: for them, testing dishwashers means scientific rigor and careful loading. Here are some highlights from their recommendations for modern appliances. You can find the rest of their dishwasher loading advice over at their site. They also have suggestions about the best detergents to use when you’re cleaning up after a large holiday gathering.

• Read the manual for tips specific to your dishwasher’s model. Really, this is important, since the setup of racks and location of water jets differs across brands and models.
• Glasses go on the prongs, which tilts them at an angle and keeps water out of many glasses with concave bases.
• Scrape big food chunks off, but don’t pre-rinse.
• Instead of pre-rinsing, run the water in your kitchen faucet until it becomes hot before starting the dishwasher, to make sure the water doesn’t start flowing in while cold.
• Put the heaviest and most soiled items on the bottom rack, keeping them in range of the spray arm. Arrange pots, pans, and plates however your dishwasher’s manual tells you to. If you’re a renter and don’t have the manual, you may be able to find it on the manufacturer’s website, or from a third party somewhere online.

New Rules for Loading New Dishwashers [Consumer Reports]
Best Dishwasher Detergents for Big Dinners [Consumer Reports]

PREVIOUSLY: Consumer Reports Battles The Prerinsing Menace

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

Gift-Wrap Shrink Ray: Walmart’s Labels Are A Little Smaller

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It’s not just food that the Grocery Shrink Ray hits: we’ve seen it strike everything from grooming products to warranties. We haven’t ever seen a Christmas label shrink ray, though, until Dave sent these pictures comparing labels purchased at Walmart during different years.

“Thought the new ones had less room to write on!” he wrote. Both of these are packages of 100 labels for $1.99, and the newer one on the left definitely gives users a little bit less room to write on. The older package seems significantly larger because the cardboard backing is so much bigger, but the labels still shrank.

 

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

Authorities Looking Into Just How Many State Jackpots May Have Been Fixed By Former Lottery Worker

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Remember the ex-lottery worker from Iowa who was convicted of rigging a state jackpot so he’d win $14 million? Authorities aren’t quite sure his insider scheme was limited to his home state, and have expanded the investigation into other parts of the U.S.

The former security director of the Des Moines-based Multi-State Lottery Association was convicted in July after prosecutors said he installed a secret software program in the system’s computers that would pick winning numbers. He then enlisted a friend in Texas to buy a ticket with those numbers to skirt state law, which says lottery employees can’t play the lottery.

Authorities accused him of tampering with drawings in four states over six years, the Associated Press, and investigators are now expanding the inquiry nationwide to see if he could’ve cast an even larger net.

Thus far, state lotteries in Colorado, Wisconsin, and Oklahoma have confirmed they paid jackpots worth $8 million to the man’s associates, including his old college roommate. To make sure they haven’t missed something, investigators are going over payouts in the 37 other states and U.S. territories that used random-number generators from the MSLA.

“It would be pretty naive to believe they are the only four” jackpots involved, said now-retired Iowa deputy attorney general Thomas H. Miller, who oversaw the investigation for 2 ½ years. “If you find one cockroach, you have to assume there are 100 more you haven’t found.”

Jackpot-fixing investigation expands to more state lotteries [Associated Press]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

One Day After Arrest For Securities Fraud, Turing Pharma CEO Martin Shkreli Resigns

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A day after he was arrested as part of a securities-fraud investigation, Turing Pharmaceuticals CEO Martin Shkreli is no longer the company’s head executive.

Though you may know Shkreli best as the guy whose company bought the rights to a generic drug used to save lives and dramatically increased the price from $13.50 to $750 overnight, a boost of more than 5400%, he’s now facing charges related to his time running a hedge fund and working at a company called Retrophin.

Today, Turing announced that Shkreli has resigned, and that company chairman Ron Tilles will fill the role of interim chief, reports the New York Times, noting that Tilles was a founder and worked in business development at Retrophin.

One Turing investor who spoke to the NYT said Shkreli’s arrest and indictment made it untenable for him to stay at the helm.

“I don’t see how he can run this company anymore,’’ said the anonymous investor. “There’s no way it doesn’t hurt the company.’’

Shkreli has been charged with illegally taking stock from Retrophin, a company he started in 2011, and using it to pay off debts from unrelated business dealings. He pleaded not guilty to the charges of securities fraud yesterday and was released on $5 million bail.

Martin Shkreli Resigns From Turing Pharmaceuticals [New York Times]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

Coolest Company President Ever Warns Employees Not To Ruin ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens’ For Everyone Else

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If you’ve been shunning social media and refusing to speak to anyone who’s already seen Star Wars: The Force Awakens, you aren’t alone. But you also know how difficult it can be for anyone to keep their traps shut around the water cooler. That’s why the coolest company president we’ve ever heard of made sure to step in and prevent life-ruining chatter before it starts.

Yesterday, workers at Pittsburgh-area moving company Starck Van Lines received a very important memo about workplace policy from the president, warning anyone with early tickets to the movie to zip those lips or face the consequences, reports Jerry Barca at Forbes.com.

The whole thing is pretty great:

From: Steve Starck
Sent: Thursday, December 17, 2015 1:29 PM
To: Starck Group
Subject: Star Wars No Disclosure Policy (SWNDP)

To All:

It has come to my attention that several employees who shall remain nameless have tickets to early showings of Star Wars: The Force Awakens in the next couple of days. Please note that discussing this movie prior to receiving the “all clear” from management on the property of Starck Van Lines is strictly prohibited and will result in disciplinary action up to and including immediate termination. Any communication, including written, electronic, or verbal, to management of the company, specifically myself, will also be considered a violation of the Star Wars No Disclosure Policy (SWNDP).

May the Force Be With You,

Steve Starck
Jedi Master
Force Awakens

Barca notes that Starck won’t actually give anyone the boot, he just doesn’t want a few chatty folks to ruin the fun for everyone else.

“Everyone is excited. I didn’t want that excitement to end up spoiling the experience for anyone else,” he told Forbes.

One Company’s Workplace Rules For Seeing ‘Star Wars: The Force Awakens’ [Forbes.com]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

Isis Pharmaceuticals Changes Name To Ionis Pharmaceuticals For Some Reason

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It’s a problem when you choose a name for your company that, a few decades later, comes to mean something else entirely. The company Isis Pharmaceuticals chose the name of an Egyptian goddess associated with good health, only to find that the public’s knowledge of Egyptian mythology is weak, and that most people associate the name with a jihadist militant group.

The name ISIS is already associated with Islamist terrorism in the public imagination, so the company decided to look for a new name. Ionis has the key advantages of still starting with “I” and ending with “S,” and not being the name of any of the participants in the civil war in Syria.

The company’s founder and CEO said that the name change came because she was tired of addressing the name issue in interviews and everyday conversations. “To spend any time during a four-minute TV interview, for example, discussing our name,” he told Forbes, “rather than focusing on how exciting things are at Isis today with three drugs finishing Phase 3 development and a pipeline of 40 drugs, just makes no sense.”

The name change also means that the company gets the cool stock ticker symbol IONS, so that’s a bonus to what must be a very annoying situation.

Drug company opts for new name, dropping ISIS [CBS News]

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

Controversial Cybersecurity Bill Makes It Into Omnibus, Will Basically Be Law Any Minute Now

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We are rapidly running out of 2015 left to spend, and so the two houses of Congress have been racing to pass an omnibus spending bill that will keep the government funded and the lights on. Because that bill is a must-pass piece of legislation, all kinds of crap has been added, taken away, and snuck back in as we come down to the wire. Among the other bills that have been tacked on is a controversial piece of cybersecurity legislation that has privacy and consumer advocates worried all around.

The bill in question is the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act of 2015 (S. 754), called CISA. Wired noticed late Wednesday that CISA had snuck into the latest, and final, version of the bill.

MORE: WHAT IS CISA? HOW DOES IT WORK? WHAT DOES IT DO?

CISA is supposed to enhance cybersecurity, in the wake of all the hacks and breaches we’ve become used to living with, by promoting data-sharing. But that sharing concerns privacy advocates, because it’s functionally limitless… and also funnels straight to the NSA.

As Wired reports, the language that made it into the omnibus is actually even worse than the last version of CISA we saw clear the Senate earlier this year. The new edition allows for agencies like the FBI and the National Intelligence director to create online portals, where companies will hand information directly to law enforcement and intelligence instead of first going through Homeland Security. The omnibus version also changes the permission for sharing from “imminent threat” to “specific threat,” meaning that timeliness is no longer a factor and agencies can search or cherry pick data for any specific terms.

The EFF continues to oppose the language, as do other advocacy groups, but the omnibus easily passed in the House and then the Senate earlier today, and is headed to President Obama’s desk as quickly as possible, where it will be signed and become law.

Congress Slips CISA Into a Budget Bill That’s Sure to Pass [Wired]

by Kate Cox via Consumerist

FDA Proposes Regulations That Would Keep Minors Out Of Tanning Beds

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Though a slew of states already have regulations in place that prohibit minors from using indoor tanning beds and sunlamps, the federal government is proposing new rules that would keep anyone under the age of 18 from getting their glow on in tanning salons.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced the proposed rules — which will be available for public comment for 90 days starting Dec. 21 — aimed at protecting public health by preventing minors from using sunlamp products, as well as reducing the risk of using indoor tanning tools for adults.

The first proposed rule would restrict the use of sunlamp devices to folks 18 years and older. Any adults going for a tanning session for the first time, as well as every six months afterward, would have to sign a risk acknowledgement certification that says they’re aware of the risks to health that could result from tanning.

The second rule the FDA proposed would require sunlamp manufacturers and tanning facilities to take extra steps to improve the overall safety of these devices, with changes like making warnings easier to read and more prominent on the device; implementing an emergency shut off switch or “panic button”; improving eye safety by adding requirements that would limit the amount of light allowed through protective eyewear, and other measures.

“Today’s action is intended to help protect young people from a known and preventable cause of skin cancer and other harms,” said acting FDA Commissioner Stephen Ostroff, M.D. “Individuals under 18 years are at greatest risk of the adverse health consequences of indoor tanning.”

Though Ostroff concedes that the FDA understands some adults might still decide to tan indoors, the proposed rules are mean to “help adults make their decisions based on truthful information and to ensure manufacturers and tanning facilities take additional steps to improve the safety of these devices.”

As the FDA notes, indoor tanning is a known contributor to skin cancer, including melanoma, and other skin damage. Despite that fact, 1.6 million minors tan inside each year, based on data in the 2013 National Youth Risk Behavior Survey.

California, Delaware, District of Columbia, Illinois, Louisiana, Minnesota, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Oregon, Texas and Vermont ban the use of tanning beds for all minors under 18.

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

Cox Must Pay $25M For Failing To Stop Repeat Pirates

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Weeks after a court ruled that Cox Communications had deliberately ignored repeat piracy offenders and put up roadblocks to prevent certain copyright holders from filing infringement claims, a jury has handed down a $25 million verdict against the cable and Internet provider.

For those new to this story, let’s take a step back. Music publishing giant BMG Rights Management accused Cox of failing to live up to its obligations under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. That law requires ISPs to do what they can to limit access for repeat copyright infringers.

If Cox had followed those guidelines, it would have benefited from “safe harbor” protections that shield Internet Service Providers from being held liable for their customers’ piracy.

But in documentation presented to the court, BMG showed that Cox was not only incredibly lenient toward repeat offenders — letting them rack up more than 10 alleged offenses before being at risk for losing their service — but also that some Cox executives were deliberately allowing known offenders to continue as customers.

“This way, we can collect a few extra weeks of payments for their account,” read an email sent by Cox’s Manager of Customer Abuse Operations.

Additionally, Cox actively blocked copyright claims from third-party rights management company RightsCorp, going so far as to prevent RightsCorp filings from ever even reaching Cox servers.

“Blocking messages goes one step beyond blacklisting,” wrote the judge in granting summary judgment for BMG. “When a complainant is blacklisted, Cox still has a record of the emails received and deleted. When a complainant is blocked at the server level, there is no record of any message received.”

In the end, a jury was asked to decide on four questions [PDF]:
• Did BMG prove that Cox customers were using their Internet access to violate BMG copyrights? The jury answered “yes.”

• Did BMG prove that Cox’s actions (or lack thereof) contributed to this infringement? Again, that’s a big “yes” from the jury.

• Did BMG prove that Cox was willful in its behavior? Quoth the jury, “yes.”

• Did BMG prove that Cox had vicariously infringed on BMG’s copyright? On this one, Cox earned a victory with a “no” from the jury.

This last question is incredibly important. Had the jury said “yes,” indicating that Cox somehow profited from the piracy, the company would have faced even larger penalties.

Holding an ISP accountable to that extent for its customers’ bad behavior could have a chilling effect on the industry, as ISPs would clamp down even harder on alleged piracy.

DMCA claims are already problematic. Many websites operate under the assumption that a copyright claim is legitimate, leading to dubious takedowns, patently false infringement allegations, and absurd demands from copyright holders.

Even in the Cox case, a number of plainly innocent customers were caught up in the lawsuit as BMG sought to have their information turned over as evidence in the case. Those who were able to prove they weren’t even Cox customers during the time in question were able to have themselves removed, but it still shows the extent to which some copyright holders will go to hold anyone they can responsible for infringement.

Even with the “no” answer from the jury on the vicarious infringement question, some privacy advocates believe the verdict could still result in stricter copyright enforcement from ISPs.

“This could have a real impact on how Internet service providers treat their customers, in a detrimental way,” Charles Duan of Public Knowledge tells Bloomberg Law. “The concern is that out of fear of these sorts of verdicts, a lot of ISPs could take a conservative approach, which could lead to account terminations for people using the Internet in legal and reasonable ways.”

by Chris Morran via Consumerist

Report: Target Is Considering Its Own Mobile Wallet App

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It seems everywhere you turn these days, another company is offering a new way to pay with a smartphone: there’s Apple Pay, Android Pay, Samsung Pay, as well as Walmart’s newly announced mobile payment system, and now Target might be hopping on the bandwagon with its own mobile wallet. Any bets on whether it’ll be called “Target Pay”?

According to a new report from Reuters citing insider sources, Target is in the early stages of developing a mobile wallet.

Though the mobile wallet could launch as early as next year, the retailer isn’t committing to anything just yet, leaving things rather up in the air at this point.

So far, Target has apparently looked into partnering with credit card companies, and is said to be in favor of processing transactions using scanning technology to communicate with payment terminals, two of the sources said. No testing has happened at any Target stores at this point, however.

If this has you wondering whether the plan by many retailers — including Target and Walmart — to launch a mobile payment system called CurrentC is over and done with, a Target spokesman tells Reuters that the retailer is still an active member of the Merchant Customer Exchange in charge of developing that system, but that it’s also exploring other mobile wallet solutions.

Exclusive: Target in initial development of its own mobile wallet – sources [Reuters]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

JPMorgan Chase To Pay $367 Million For Secretly Steering Clients To Investments That Benefited Bank

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When you pay a bank’s investment adviser to help you put your money in a smart place, you would hope that they would steer you to a product that best serves your interest. You’d also hope that if an investment product benefited the bank, this information would be clearly disclosed. But that’s not always the case, which is why JPMorgan Chase has to pay penalties totaling $367 million.

The majority ($267 million) of that amount is to settle charges brought against Chase by the Securities and Exchange Commission, which accused two of the bank’s wealth management subsidiaries of failing to disclose conflicts of interest to clients.

The SEC found that JPMorgan Securities and JPMorgan Chase Bank preferred to invest clients in the firm’s own proprietary investment products, but didn’t exactly go out of their way to disclose this preference. The regulators say that, without this information, JPMorgan’s were deprived of information they needed to make fully informed investment decisions.

“Firms have an obligation to communicate all conflicts so a client can fairly judge the investment advice they are receiving,” explains Andrew J. Ceresney, Director of the SEC Enforcement Division. “These JPMorgan subsidiaries failed to disclose that they preferred to invest client money in firm-managed mutual funds and hedge funds, and clients were denied all the facts to determine why investment decisions were being made by their investment advisers.”

According to Julie M. Riewe, Co-Chief of the SEC Enforcement Division’s Asset Management Unit, JPMorgan Securities also breached its fiduciary duty to certain clients “when it did not inform them that they were being invested in a more expensive share class of proprietary mutual funds,” while Chase bank failed to disclose that it was steering clients to hedge funds that made payments to a JPMorgan.

“Clients are entitled to know whether their adviser has competing interests that might cause it to render self-interested investment advice,” says Riewe.

In a parallel settlement with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, JPMorgan has agreed to pay a total of $100 million in penalties and disgorgements.

“Investors are entitled to know if a bank managing their money favors placing investments in its own proprietary funds or other vehicles that generate fees for the bank,” says Aitan Goelman, the CFTC’s Director of Enforcement.

As part of the settlement agreements, Chase had admitted to disclosure failures, but maintains they “were not intentional and we regret them… We have always strived for full transparency in client communications, and in the last two years have further enhanced our disclosures in support of that goal.”

by Chris Morran via Consumerist

Uber Sends Drivers New Contract That Includes Opting Out Of Any Current Class Actions

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Was Uber trying to deliberately trick its drivers when it sent out a new driver agreement, or just trying to make its contract provisions clearer? While the company’s attorneys claim that the new driver contract wouldn’t actually preclude drivers still working for them from taking part in the California lawsuit or other lawsuits against them, the attorney for the affected drivers disagrees.

Uber, meanwhile, insists that the new agreement that employees must agree to is meant to be simpler and easier to understand than the original one, clearing up some issues that are the subject of criticism against the company and litigation. Now, the judge in the class action case has ordered Uber not to communicate with employees who are part of the lawsuit without having those communications first run past the drivers’ lawyer in the class action or the court itself.

What did the new agreement say? It asked drivers to waive their right to sue the company, forcing them into arbitration, and also demanded that drivers who want to continue with the service are barred from “participating in or recovering relief under any current or future” class action lawsuits against the company. While that does simplify the driver contract, it also caused panic among drivers who want to be part of the lawsuit.

The good news is that there is an opt-out provision, but the plaintiffs’ attorney says that her office received hundreds of calls from panicked drivers who wondered whether opting out would be enough to allow them to both drive for Uber and remain part of the lawsuit against the company. The class action seeks to have drivers treated as employees, which would include a minimum hourly rate and reimbursement of routine expenses like mileage and car insurance.

Judge Faults Uber for Confusing Drivers With New Contract [Bloomberg News]

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

Applebee’s Server Returns $32,000 In Cash Family Accidentally Left On The Table

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If you work in a restaurant, finding a large amount of cash on the table might be one of those moments where you think you’ve just lucked out and scored a huge tip from some abnormally generous person, and you figure the money is yours to keep. Or, if you’re like one Applebee’s server who recently discovered $32,000 left behind, you turn it in and save the day.

A mother and daughter who went ate at an Applebee’s in Fresno, CA this week had made a few stops that day, including a bank, reports KFSN. They hadn’t planned on carrying around all that dough all day, but that’s how it worked out.

“We were going to deposit it to the safe box and they told us they didn’t have any available,” the daughter explained. She thinks her mother took the cash out of her wallet when it was time to pay for their meal, and didn’t put it back in her bag.

By that night, they realized the money — savings from the family’s business — was gone, and figured it wasn’t coming back.

The server who’d waited on them found the money left behind at the booth and turned it in, and police matched up the money with the family after they described the bag it was in and the denominations included. The family is planning to thank the server and police for reuniting them with their money, and hopes that the server will accept at least a little something as a reward.

But he doesn’t want to speak publicly about his good deed, his managers said, and might not take any reward he’s offered.

“He made it very clear that he did it because it was the right thing to do, not that he wanted anything in return,” an Applebee’s area director told KFSN.com.

Honest Applebee’s server reunites family, $32,000 cash [KFSN]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

Comcast Customer’s Data Cap Meter Counts Gigabytes He Couldn’t Possibly Use

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In just the few months since Comcast began expanding its cash-grab data cap program, which hits customers with overage charges for exceeding an arbitrary allotment of 300 gigabytes each month, thousands of customers have already complained to federal regulators. Some claim that the Comcast-supplied online “meter” intended to help keep track of users’ data simply doesn’t work. One customer, after being told that he was repeatedly going over the monthly limit, has shown just how broken Comcast’s system really is.

The customer, a programmer from Tennessee, recently told his story to Ars Technica. He explained that Comcast was sending him warning messages about exceeding its newly enforced caps and that he’d begin being charged for overages if he didn’t cut back.

He knew he wasn’t going over the limit, but Comcast wouldn’t believe him. Reps for the company shrugged off his calls, saying that if he wasn’t the one blasting through gigabytes, then someone must be leaching on to his WiFi.

The breaking point occurred after he found that Comcast accused him of using 120GB of data during a period when he wasn’t just away from home — but out of the country on vacation.

In order to demonstrate to Comcast that he wasn’t mysteriously streaming Netflix through his home modem from a continent away and that some clever neighbor hadn’t bypassed his home network’s security, the customer disconnected his cable modem for nearly a week, using only cellular data for those days.

Without the modem attached, there’s no way that he — or any WiFi hanger-on — could access the Comcast network, and yet, according to the company’s data cap meter he’d used 66GB during those six days.

Additionally, the customer — who didn’t change his in-home data use during this time; just did it all over a cellular network — found that he’d only used around 8GB of data. Assuming that’s an average week for his home use, there’s no way he’d come even close to reaching 300GB/month. He’d have to be averaging more than 8GB a day to hit that threshold.

When Ars contacted Comcast, the company fessed up to the goof, but did not appear to offer any explanation other than, “There was a technical error associated with his account, which we have since corrected.”

The company did apparently tell the customer that it had gotten him confused with another Comcast user.

“It turns out their system had my modem MAC address entered incorrectly,” he explained to Ars, “there was an off-by-one typo that was hard to see so they were counting data from some modem who knows where.”

Comcast maintains that its data cap meter is accurate around 94% of the time, but let’s give the company an even bigger benefit of a doubt and assume that this sort of problem affects about half of one percent of Comcast users. That’s still more than 100,000 people, many of whom may not know exactly how much data streaming videos and other content consumes. These users may be paying overage fees they don’t owe.

Brian Roberts, the Comcast CEO who does a horrible job of defending the company his daddy left him, has repeatedly tried to explain that data caps are about making sure that customers who use the most pay the most. But in reality, it’s more of a case of making sure that the customer that Comcast mistakenly thinks uses the most is subsidizing someone else’s overuse.

by Chris Morran via Consumerist

FCC Wants AT&T, Comcast, T-Mobile To Explain Why Their Plans That Exempt Stuff From Data Caps Are OK

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There are two big trends in data and streaming. The first is data caps, which limit how much bandwidth you can use in a month without paying extra. The other is zero-rating, where certain video services come to an arrangement with carriers to be exempt from those data caps. In theory, it’s a win for everyone: consumers, carriers, and streaming companies. But nobody, including the FCC, is quite sure if it’s actually, y’know, legal.

That’s why the FCC has sent letters to AT&T, T-Mobile, and Comcast asking them to come in to the office for a little chat about the way they exempt streaming services from data caps. Everyone has been asked to schedule a meeting by January 15.

Here’s the background: The still-contested Open Internet Rule — net neutrality, to most of us — prohibits any internet company from discriminating among services in the traffic they carry. It applies to fixed broadband, like the network that comes to your home, as well as to the mobile carriers that make your phone go. They can’t permit or force YouTube to load faster than Netflix, or Spotify more slowly than Pandora, no matter who wants to pay them truckloads of money to do so. But the rule doesn’t have any specifications in it about data limits, or exempting certain services from them.

That’s zero-rating. It was a big, fat open question left hanging when the FCC approved net neutrality back in February, and it still is today. But it is basically universally true that when something isn’t explicitly against the rules, and could be a source of revenue, people and companies will try it. And so they have.

T-Mobile has made the biggest splash with their services. They launched Music Freedom, which exempts a whole bunch of audio streaming services from data caps, way back in 2014. Last month, it was joined by Binge On for video, which launched with about two dozen services, large and small, already included.

AT&T, meanwhile, offers separate-but-related sponsored data, and is pursuing plans to work out deals with certain video apps to charge them for exemption from data caps as well.

The mobile market isn’t alone; we’re seeing examples of zero-ratings popping up in home broadband plans too, as data caps proliferate (to consumers’ chagrin). Comcast recently launched a pilot streaming-only service, and it, naturally, is exempt from Comcast’s data caps, where services like Netflix are not.

Last month FCC chair Tom Wheeler described the plans as “highly innovative and highly competitive” offerings… but that doesn’t mean the FCC isn’t interested in making sure they’re kosher.

The FCC is “asking [AT&T, Comcast, and T-Mobile] to come in and have a discussion with us about some of the innovative things they are doing,” Wheeler said during a press conference yesterday.

“This is not an investigation,” Wheeler stressed. “This is not any enforcement. This is, ‘Help us stay informed as to what the practices are.'”

by Kate Cox via Consumerist

Chipotle Facing First Lawsuit Linked To Boston Norovirus Outbreak That Sickened 140 People

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It was bound to happen: the first lawsuit has been fired — er, filed against Chipotle in connection with the recent norovirus outbreak that sickened 140 people who ate at one of the chain’s Boston locations.

The mom of a 16-year-old boy who fell ill after eating at the same Boston College location linked to a total of 140 illnesses is suing the restaurant chain, seeking damages for the days he was sick, reports the Boston Globe.

The mom who filed this suit says her three teenage boys used to eat at Chipotle two or three times a week, and that she believed it was a healthier choice than other fast-food options.

“We believed in the brand,” she told the Globe. “I feel a little duped.”

She says her son had a burrito at Chipotle on Dec. 4, and began throwing up early the next morning. By the afternoon, “he was so sick he was almost catatonic,” she said. “He was sheet white. His heart was racing.”

After a trip to the hospital for fluids and anti-nausea medicine, the teen still has fully recovered, his mom says, and suffers from lingering cramps and dizziness. A test this week confirmed norovirus is still lingering in his system.

The lawsuit alleges that Chipotle’s negligence caused the teen “to suffer severe personal injuries, to suffer great pain of body and mind, to incur hospital and medical expenses, to have his education and recreational activities interrupted, and to have his ability to enjoy a normal, active, and healthy live adversely affected.”

This is the first lawsuit against Chipotle but it’ll likely be far from the last. There are at least 139 people who also reported symptoms like nausea and vomiting days after eating at the location during the first weekend of December.

“Chipotle needs to be held responsible for what happened,” the lawyer leading the case told the Globe. He says he’s been in touch with several BC students and expects to file more suits after everyone is done with their holiday fun.

Though young people and students are probably not going to suffer in the long-term from norovirus, the lawyer said the lawsuits will “send a pretty clear message that… this is not something that should have happened.”

The restaurant closed on Dec. 7 by order of the city, after an inspection uncovered three major violations — including a worker who was sick on the job and a failure to adequately heat chicken and beef — and remains closed.

Chipotle’s communications director, Chris Arnold, said the company can’t comment on pending legal action as a matter of policy.

“But I will note in incidents like this, we make it a priority to work with customers who have been impacted to resolve these issues,” he said in a statement to the Globe.

In the meantime, Chipotle’s CEO and co-founder Steve Ells has been riding the apology train all over the nation’s newspapers, apologizing for the Boston outbreak as well as the that the chain has been linked to a nine-state E. coli outbreak that’s sickened more than 50 people.

Mother sues Chipotle over son’s bout of norovirus [The Boston Globe]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

McDonald’s Testing Mac & Cheese Cups In Happy Meals

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Would you like a cup of mac and cheese with your burger? That may not sound appealing to you, but the pasta dish is a major food group for small children, and the idea is getting a limited-time test in Cleveland. The cups would probably be pre-prepared, so frazzled franchisees wouldn’t have much to complain about regarding the new menu item.

Brand Eating reports that at least one restaurant in Cleveland has the cups, but we don’t know which one if you happen to live or be visiting that city soon. What we do know is that mac and cheese is just a Happy Meal option in place of fries, and that it’s a limited-time offer with an end point that hasn’t been announced yet.

McMacAndCheese is also available on its own to grown-ups for $1.75, but probably doesn’t come in a pretty ceramic dish like in the picture.

McDonald's Testing Mac & Cheese as a Happy Meal Option [Brand Eating]

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

Calling All Last-Minute Shoppers: Today Is “Free Shipping Day”

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It sounds pretty simple — it’s Free Shipping Day today (now you know), so one might think a bunch of retailers are offering up complimentary shipping, for delivery by Christmas Eve. One would be right, because there are a lot of stores dangling that bait, though not all of them will just hand it over without a little song and dance first.

By “song and dance,” we actually mean, “some stores will make you enter a discount code to get free shipping today.” Others — including Target and Best Buy — might already be on the free shipping train for the holidays, so it isn’t really news. But it’s still free!

For an extensive list of all the 1,000+ or so merchants offering free shipping on in-stock, ready-to ship items, you can scroll through FreeShippingDay.com by category. Here are a few to get you started:

Walmart: free shipping, no minimum

Cabela’s: free shipping, no minimum with code 5FREESHIP

Bass Pro Shop: free shipping, no minimum

Belk’s: $10 off $50 purchase, free shipping

Target: Free shipping

Neiman Marcus: Free upgraded shipping with code NMRUSH

JCPenney: Free shipping with code SHIPDAY

Children’s Place: Free shipping

GameStop: Free shipping with code GAMES4U

Talbots: Free shipping on all orders

Harry & David: Free shipping on Christmas Gifts, use code GIFT

Aldo: Free shipping

Land’s End: Free shipping plus 50% off everything (excludes sale and clearance). Use code FREESHIPDAY

Lord & Taylor: Free second-day air shipping upgrade on all orders, select second-day air at checkout.

Lane Bryant: $20 off orders of $90+, free shipping on all orders using code FS9020LB

Art.com: 30% + free shipping on all orders, use code FREESHIPART15

Nordstrom: Free standard shipping on all orders

Bloomingdale’s: Free shipping on all in-stock merchandise

L.L. Bean: Free shipping on all orders

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist

Consumerist Friday Flickr Finds

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Here are eight of the best photos that readers added to the Consumerist Flickr Pool in the last week, picked for usability in a Consumerist post or for just plain neatness.

Want to see your pictures on our site? Our Flickr pool is the place where Consumerist readers upload photos for possible use in future Consumerist posts. Just be a registered Flickr user, go here, and click “Join Group?” up on the top right. Choose your best photos, then click “send to group” on the individual images you want to add to the pool.

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

Maybe Americans Are Eating Cereal Again After All

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Earlier this year, we reported that the cereal business in the United States is hurting, possibly because of protein-mania and Americans switching to other breakfast foods. One company that began to see signs of trouble was Cheerios-maker General Mills, which managed to cut costs and follow current food trends, boosting its profits.

It seemed like a great thing when Cheerios became gluten-free, which was a great thing for people with celiac disease and gluten sensitivity. Then disaster hit the production line this fall: wheat flour was mistakenly mixed into some batches, making customers sick and leading to a recall and class action lawsuits. No one attributes that to General Mills’ cost-cutting, but it’s worth remembering that cost-cutting by laying off experienced workers can lead to production mistakes and other problems.

We don’t know whether sales of the allegedly misleading product Protein Cheerios helped or hurt the company’s bottom line, but learning modern customers’ tastes and removing additives will be the way forward for all chain restaurants and food companies.

General Mills Profit Rises, Helped by Cost Cuts [Wall Street Journal]

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

Safeway Says No Payment Data Stolen From California Stores, Only Colorado

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There’s potential good news out of Safeway: while the company confirmed that they found skimmers in credit card payment terminals in two California stores, a spokesperson claims that the baddies didn’t harvest any customer data from them: instead, the grocer found them back in September while inspecting terminals. While it’s good news that customers didn’t walk up to an ATM only to find their bank accounts drained, it’s still worrisome that someone was able to install the skimmers in the first place.

“It is important for customers to know that no credit or debit card data was compromised by the two skimmers,” a Safeway spokesperson told the San Jose Mercury News. “No skimmers have been discovered since that time.”

The company denies that skimmers were found in the California towns of Castro Valley and Menlo Park, which the blog Krebs on Security reported was one theory that security experts in banks had shared. The payment terminals that were compromised were in Dublin and Walnut Creek, and Safeway claims that no customer data was taken from those stores. If banks were following a scam trail that led to northern California, though, there may be something to that: other retailers should worry.

Safeway: Customers’ data not compromised by skimming attack at Bay Area stores [San Jose Mercury News]

by Laura Northrup via Consumerist

That 40% Off All Kroger Purchases Coupon Circulating On Facebook Is Just A Big Fat Scam

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File this one under things we’ve said a million times and will say as many times as it takes to keep all shoppers away from scammy things: if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is… especially if it’s showing up all over Facebook. So it goes with the most recent coupon scam circulating social media, a fake Kroger coupon offering 40% off all store purchases.

Even though it has all sorts of coupon-y language and restrictions — “no rain checks” and “limit one coupon or offer per guest” — it’s big fat scam, Kroger confirmed on its own Facebook page:

Attention Kroger Customers: There is currently an unauthorized “40% off all purchases in store” offer circulating. This giveaway is not affiliated with or supported by the Kroger Co. in any way. We recommend not engaging with the site(s) that offer links to the coupon, or providing them with any personal information. Our team is actively working with Facebook and domain service providers to address the concern.

Because retailers generally aren’t in the mood to steeply discount their prices for no apparent reason, these kinds of offers are pretty much always fake. There was the bogus chance to get 50% off everything from Target for liking a Facebook page; this $200 off everything at Kroger scam; a fake offer for $100 worth of free stuff at Publix

It’s always a good idea to check with the retailer’s Facebook page to start with — any special offers will likely be included on the official page, or if you’re in doubt, the company may have already refuted the deal in question, like Kroger did in this case. You can also hover over any links included with the coupon: if the URL leads to something other than the retailer’s official site, it’s safe to say it’s a fake.

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist