Predatory Business Practices
Conduct Screen Corporate Misconduct
Multi-level marketing structures, rent-seeking platforms, and business models that exploit customers, distributors, or communities
67 companies currently excluded under this screen
Excluded Companies (67 total)
Showing 25 of 67 companies excluded under this screen.
| Ticker | Company | Reason |
|---|---|---|
| ELV | ELEVANCE HEALTH INC | Elevance Health (formerly Anthem) operates one of the largest U.S. health insurance platforms, covering approximately 46 million members. Federal and state regulators have documented a pattern of predatory insurance practices spanning claim denials, data fraud, enrollment manipulation, and provider network misrepresentation. In February 2026, CMS imposed intermediate sanctions suspending Medicare beneficiary enrollment into Elevance's MA-PD plans, citing seven years of knowing noncompliance — the insurer submitted risk adjustment data via flash drives despite repeated CMS directives to use electronic systems. The sanction affects plans covering 1.9 million members. Separately, the Manhattan U.S. Attorney filed a civil fraud suit in March 2020 alleging Anthem used vendor Medi-Connect to run "one-sided" retrospective chart reviews that added diagnosis codes inflating Medicare payments but deliberately refused to delete invalid codes that would reduce revenue. The court estimated overpayments exceeded $100 million per year from 2014 to 2018; triple damages are sought and the case remains in discovery. In 2025, DOJ filed a second False Claims Act complaint naming Elevance alongside Aetna and Humana for hundreds of millions in illegal kickbacks to insurance brokers for Medicare Advantage enrollments between 2016 and 2021, coupled with allegations of discrimination against disabled Americans. At the state level, California's DMHC fined Anthem $15 million in January 2026 for longstanding grievance and appeals failures, $8.5 million for mishandling 98,955 payment disputes, and $750,000 for sending 5,200 denial letters with incorrect appeal instructions. A federal court approved a $12.88 million class settlement for systematically denying mental health and substance use disorder claims using overly restrictive medical necessity guidelines (2017-2025). Three separate class actions allege Elevance maintains "ghost networks" — provider directories listing physicians who are not actually available — leaving members, including families of disabled children, unable to access care. In August 2025, a Texas federal judge rejected Elevance's lawsuit to inflate its Medicare Advantage star ratings, costing the company at least $375 million in bonus payments. Multiple health systems have sued for unpaid claims, including Bon Secours ($93 million) and Valley Health ($11.4 million). |
| INTU | Intuit | Intuit's business model depends on the complexity of the U.S. tax code and the absence of government-provided filing tools. Since 1998, Intuit has spent over $45.7 million on federal lobbying, much of it specifically to prevent the IRS from offering free direct filing. A 2007 Intuit board presentation (obtained by ProPublica) stated: "For a decade proposals have sought to create IRS tax software or a ReturnFree Tax System; All were stopped." Intuit helped create the IRS Free File Alliance — an agreement where the IRS pledged NOT to build its own free filing system in exchange for industry providing free filing to low-income taxpayers — then systematically undermined the free filing it promised to provide (hiding free pages from search engines, redirecting IRS Free File searches to paid products). When the IRS launched Direct File as a pilot (delivering $106 in taxpayer benefit per $1 invested), Intuit spent $3.7M on lobbying in 2024 (a record) and $1.2M in Q1 2025 alone. Intuit donated $1M to Trump's inauguration. 29 House Republicans who signed a letter calling for Trump to kill Direct File received a combined $1.8M in career contributions from tax prep industry PACs. The IRS killed Direct File. Intuit withdrew from Free File in July 2021 once it became clear the no-compete clause was being dropped, leaving fewer free options for low-income filers than at any point in recent years. This is textbook rent-seeking through regulatory capture — preserving extraction from a captive population (taxpayers who must file), disproportionately harming low-income Americans. |
| ALGN | Align Technology | Align Technology operates a vertically integrated business model for its Invisalign clear aligner system that creates significant barriers to competition and locks in dental professionals. The company requires orthodontists and dentists to purchase proprietary iTero intraoral scanners to use Invisalign, bundling the hardware with its treatment planning software and aligner manufacturing. This closed ecosystem effectively controls the digital workflow from scan to final product. In an antitrust lawsuit filed in 2018 (3Shape Trios A/S v. Align Technology, Inc., 1:18-cv-01332), competitor 3Shape alleged Align engaged in exclusionary and predatory practices. The complaint detailed that Align ties scanner purchases to access to its Invisalign system, refusing to interoperate with third-party scanning equipment. This conduct allegedly maintains Align's monopoly in the clear aligner market by foreclosing competition in the adjacent digital scanning market. The lawsuit framed these practices as a strategy by a "larger, more controlling competitor" to dominate the digital dentistry value chain. This business model extracts recurring revenue from dental practices through mandatory hardware upgrades and software subscriptions, while limiting clinician choice and potentially increasing patient costs. The structure exemplifies a rent-seeking platform that leverages dominance in one product segment (clear aligners) to control and monetize an adjacent market (digital scanners), exploiting its customer base of healthcare providers. |
| LIVE | LIVE VENTURES INC | Live Ventures operates a business model centered on the acquisition and consolidation of small to mid-sized companies across various sectors, including flooring, steel, and entertainment. This roll-up strategy is fundamentally structured to extract value from these acquired entities and their customer bases, often prioritizing financial engineering and cost-cutting over sustainable growth or community benefit. The model fits the definition of a rent-seeking platform, where corporate returns are derived from consolidating market positions and leveraging scale to exert pressure on suppliers and customers, rather than from innovation or improved service. The company’s strategy mirrors patterns identified in analyses of predatory business practices, where a central firm uses its capital structure to absorb competitors or complementary businesses, not to enhance their operations, but to control market channels and extract fees. This approach can suppress local competition and exploit the acquired companies' existing customer relationships for short-term financial gain. While specific regulatory actions or consumer harm lawsuits are not detailed in the gathered evidence, the core business model of Live Ventures is archetypal of the extractive, roll-up strategies that define exclusion under the predatory_business category. Further evidence is needed to document specific instances of consumer or community harm resulting from this corporate strategy. |
| LRN | Stride, Inc | Stride, Inc. (LRN) operates as a for-profit education service provider, contracting with public school districts to manage online K-12 academies. Its business model relies on converting per-pupil public education funding into corporate revenue, creating inherent incentives to maximize enrollment and minimize instructional costs. This structure has drawn scrutiny for potentially exploiting public education systems and the families they serve. Numerous lawsuits and state audits have documented patterns of misconduct. In 2020, a California lawsuit alleged Stride’s subsidiary, Insight Schools, engaged in fraudulent enrollment practices to inflate state funding. A 2021 audit by the North Carolina State Education Assistance Authority found Stride’s NC Virtual Academy failed to meet performance standards and improperly claimed funding for ineligible students. The Center for Responsible Lending has cited cases linking for-profit online charter operators to predatory practices that harm students and taxpayers. The company’s financial performance is directly tied to public funding allocations, with over 90% of its revenue derived from managing public charter schools. This positions Stride’s model as a form of rent-seeking, where corporate profit is extracted from a essential public service budget with recurring allegations of prioritizing enrollment numbers over educational outcomes and regulatory compliance. |
| LOPE | GRAND CANYON EDUCATION INC | Grand Canyon Education, Inc. (GCE) operates the for-profit arm of Grand Canyon University (GCU), a business model centered on aggressive, deceptive marketing of doctoral and other graduate programs to prospective students. The core allegation across multiple federal actions is that the company systematically misled students about the true cost and duration of its degrees. In January 2023, the U.S. Department of Education fined GCU a record $37.7 million for lying to more than 7,500 students about the cost of its doctoral programs. The Federal Trade Commission filed suit against GCE, GCU, and CEO Brian Mueller in December 2023, alleging they orchestrated a "deceitful scheme" in their marketing. The FTC complaint details how the company used "false promises" about low, locked-in tuition rates to lure students, who then faced significantly higher costs. This pattern of deception triggered a separate class-action lawsuit filed by students in June 2024. The regulatory actions paint a picture of a business model that exploits the financial aspirations of students through misleading claims, fitting the definition of a predatory, extractive operation. |
| CHGG | CHEGG INC | Chegg operates a subscription-based online education platform that has been the subject of multiple regulatory and legal actions for deceptive and exploitative business practices. In September 2025, the Federal Trade Commission announced a $7.5 million settlement with Chegg over allegations that the company used deceptive billing and cancellation practices, violating the FTC Act and the Restore Online Shoppers’ Confidence Act. This followed a December 2021 shareholder class action lawsuit alleging securities fraud. The company’s core model, which markets “study help” services, has been widely criticized as predatory. Its platform is frequently cited in academic integrity investigations for enabling cheating, with institutions reporting that Chegg shares detailed user data, including IP addresses and payment information, during official probes. While Chegg has sued Google for allegedly using its content to train AI models, its own business practices center on extracting recurring revenue from a student customer base often under acute academic pressure, with a documented pattern of making it difficult to cancel subscriptions and obtain refunds. |
| PRDO | PERDOCEO EDUCATION CORP | Perdoceo Education Corporation, operating through its subsidiaries Colorado Technical University and American InterContinental University, has a business model centered on recruiting and enrolling students into for-profit degree programs. This model has generated extensive allegations of exploiting students, particularly military veterans and servicemembers, for federal financial aid revenue. The company has been the subject of over 500 complaints from military-connected students detailing deceptive recruiting and financial aid practices. The Federal Trade Commission sent nearly $30 million in refunds to people deceived by agents working on behalf of Perdoceo’s predecessor, Career Education Corporation. The U.S. Department of Education has initiated a fact-finding process into “several thousand” Borrower Defense claims against Perdoceo schools, indicating a pattern of alleged misconduct that could result in false claims for payment. In 2022, the Department of Education deepened its probe following indictments from former employees regarding consistent misconduct in deceptive recruiting and financial aid administration. |
| KR | Kroger Company (The) | Kroger has engaged in a documented pattern of deceptive pricing practices that systematically overcharge customers at the point of sale. Investigations by Consumer Reports and other consumer watchdogs in 2025 found Kroger stores in multiple states listing expired sale tags on shelves but then charging customers the regular, higher price at checkout. This practice of advertising discounts that are not honored at the register exploits customer trust and results in direct financial harm to shoppers. The company’s digital and data practices further compound consumer harm. Consumer Reports has also exposed issues with Kroger’s online consent management, where dark patterns and malfunctioning banners fail to properly block tracking cookies and data collection, undermining user privacy. This combination of overcharging at physical stores and opaque data extraction online reflects a business model that prioritizes extracting maximum value from customers through potentially exploitative means, rather than competing on transparent value. |
| SLDE | SLIDE INSURANCE HOLDINGS INC | ### The Florida "Depopulation" Engine: Concise Summary Slide (SLDE) and Heritage (HRTG) grow primarily through a state-sanctioned process that offloads risk from Florida's taxpayer-backed "insurer of last resort" (**Citizens**) onto private companies. #### **How it Works: The "Inertia" Funnel** 1. **Selection:** Private companies scan the Citizens database and "cherry-pick" lower-risk homes they want to insure. 2. **The Offer:** You receive a letter in the mail. If the private company’s premium is **within 20%** of what Citizens would charge you, the state declares you "ineligible" for Citizens. 3. **The Trap:** If you ignore the letter (or it gets lost in the mail), you are **automatically transferred** to the private company. Your mortgage escrow is billed, and your previous state-backed coverage is canceled without your signature. #### **The Core Criticisms** * **"Legalized Extortion":** Consumer advocates call it "highway robbery" because homeowners are forced into private... |
| PRGS | Progress Software | Progress Software’s MOVEit Transfer file transfer solution contained a zero-day SQL injection vulnerability that was mass‑exploited by the Clop ransomware group in May 2023. The breach exposed sensitive data across hundreds of organizations, triggering multiple federal class action lawsuits consolidated in the District of Massachusetts. As of September 2025, the court has largely denied Progress Software’s motions to dismiss these claims. The Securities and Exchange Commission opened a fact‑finding investigation into the incident in October 2023. While the SEC concluded its investigation in August 2024 without recommending enforcement action, the underlying civil litigation alleges that the company’s software security failures enabled widespread harm. This pattern of deploying business‑critical software with a vulnerability that enabled systemic data extraction fits the definition of a rent‑seeking platform that externalizes security costs onto its customers and their communities. |
| GOGO | GOGO INC | Gogo Inc. operates a business aviation internet service that has been found to engage in anticompetitive conduct to maintain its market position. In February 2026, a Delaware jury found Gogo liable for infringing on SmartSky Networks' 5G air-to-ground transmission patents, awarding $22.7 million in damages. This patent infringement is part of a broader, ongoing legal conflict. In December 2024, SmartSky filed a separate antitrust lawsuit against Gogo, alleging multiple violations of federal and state laws, including the Sherman Act. The lawsuit, which seeks over $1 billion in damages, accuses Gogo of employing exclusionary tactics to stifle competition in the in-flight connectivity market for private aircraft. This pattern of leveraging intellectual property litigation and alleged anticompetitive practices demonstrates a business model that seeks to extract rents by foreclosing market access to rivals, rather than competing solely on product innovation or service quality. |
| BMY | Bristol-Myers Squibb Company | BMS/Celgene weaponized the FDA-mandated REMS safety program for Revlimid (lenalidomide) as a barrier to generic competition — the most documented case of REMS abuse in US pharmaceutical history. Strategy: (1) denied drug samples to generic manufacturers citing "safety," blocking required FDA bioequivalence testing; (2) filed 206 patents (117 granted) creating a prohibitive thicket; (3) settled with generics under volume caps limiting them to 7% market share years after the primary patent expired in October 2019, with restrictions not fully lifting until January 2026. Price rose from $215/pill (2005) to $763/pill (post-acquisition) — 254% vs 31% CPI inflation. ~$100B lifetime revenue. House Oversight found Celgene rewarded executives with $400M in compensation tied to price increases. Active antitrust lawsuits from Mayo Clinic, Cigna (alleging BMS leveraged Revlimid settlements to extract pay-for-delay on Pomalyst), and class actions. |
| ENVA | ENOVA INTERNATIONAL INC | Enova International operates an online lending platform that extends high-cost installment loans and lines of credit, primarily to subprime borrowers. The company's business model is predicated on extracting fees and interest from financially vulnerable consumers. On November 15, 2023, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau fined Enova $15 million for being a repeat offender, having violated a prior 2019 order. The CFPB found Enova continued to debit or attempt to debit consumers' bank accounts without their permission, a practice known as "unauthorized withdrawals." The company had previously paid a $3.2 million penalty in 2019 and was ordered to cease this illegal conduct. This pattern of regulatory violations demonstrates a systemic business practice of exploiting customer accounts. The CFPB's 2023 action also cited Enova for deceiving customers about loan extensions and for failing to provide required privacy notices. |
| ARES | Ares Management | Ares Management acquired Neiman Marcus in 2013 for $6 billion, loading $4.9 billion in funded debt. In 2017-2018, Ares and CPPIB allegedly orchestrated a fraudulent transfer — removing MyTheresa (valued at ~$1 billion) from creditor restrictions and distributing it to the parent company for no consideration. Neiman Marcus filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy in May 2020. Separately, Ares/Pretium's HavenBrook Homes filed 500+ evictions during the CDC pandemic moratorium, with a 4x higher eviction rate in majority-Black counties (DeKalb/Clayton GA ~20%) vs majority-white counties (Polk FL ~5%). Senate Banking Chair Sherrod Brown raised concerns. Minnesota AG Keith Ellison sued HavenBrook for uninhabitable housing — properties lacking heat, backed-up sewers, mold, lead paint risks to children, and moratorium violations. Settled for $4.2M. The Minnesota State Board of Investment pulled a $100M commitment to an Ares subsidiary. |
| WHR | Whirlpool Corporation | Whirlpool Corporation designs its appliances with integrated electronic control boards and specialized components available only through Whirlpool-authorized channels. This forces consumers and independent repair technicians into a monopoly aftermarket, where replacement parts are sold at significant markups and repair information is tightly controlled. The company has actively defended this model through litigation and trade complaints. In a 2012 case before the U.S. International Trade Commission, Whirlpool petitioned to block imports of aftermarket parts for its appliances, arguing they infringed on trade dress. More recently, the company has welcomed court rulings in pricing lawsuits that reinforce its control over distribution channels. Product reliability issues compound the cost of repair barriers. In 2019, Whirlpool recalled hundreds of thousands of washing machines due to fire risks. |
| FA | First Advantage Corp | First Advantage, one of the largest employment background screening companies, has faced systemic FCRA violations for issuing inaccurate background check reports that harmed job seekers. Federal courts have documented cases of mixed-file errors where criminal records belonging to different individuals were attributed to applicants, directly causing lost employment. In one case, a man repeatedly lost job offers after First Advantage confused his record with a convicted felon sharing a similar name. The company settled a class action for conducting background checks without prior consumer authorization, affecting screenings from 2012 to 2020. The CFPB has received 265 consumer complaints. In November 2024, a data breach exposed names, Social Security numbers, and driver's license numbers of affected consumers, prompting additional class action litigation. |
| CMCSA | Comcast Corporation | Comcast faces an active antitrust trial (Viamedia v. Comcast, scheduled October 5, 2026) alleging Comcast monopolizes local TV ad sales by leveraging control of interconnects; ~$300M in damages sought. The Supreme Court denied Comcast's certiorari petition in 2021 and summary judgment was denied in October 2025. In Washington State, a King County judge found Comcast committed 445,000+ violations of the Consumer Protection Act — charging ~31,000 customers for a Service Protection Plan without consent and misrepresenting costs to ~18,700 more — resulting in a $9.1M penalty (highest trial award in state CPA history) plus full restitution with 12% interest. The FCC has fined Comcast $2.3M for billing complaints and $1.5M for a 2025 data breach affecting 237,000 customers. In ~40% of American zip codes, Comcast or its peers are the sole broadband provider. |
| SCOR | COMSCORE INC | Comscore operates a digital media measurement and analytics business that has faced regulatory scrutiny for its business practices. In 2014, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) filed an administrative complaint against the company, alleging that its data collection practices were deceptive. The FTC order (File No. 112 3098) required Comscore to pay $3.5 million and prohibited misrepresentations about its data collection. The core allegation was that the company bundled its tracking software with other desirable applications without clearly disclosing the extent of data harvesting, a model that regulators identified as exploiting the information asymmetry between the company and consumers. This enforcement action highlights a business approach reliant on opaque user surveillance as a foundational input for its analytics products. |
| ACHC | Acadia Healthcare Co Inc | Acadia Healthcare operated psychiatric facilities that admitted patients who did not meet inpatient criteria, held them beyond clinical necessity, and billed Medicare, Medicaid, and TRICARE for medically unnecessary behavioral health services from 2014 to 2017. The DOJ alleged the company knowingly understaffed facilities, resulting in patient assaults, elopements, and suicides. Two whistleblowers, a former executive who resigned in 2016 and a compliance officer fired in 2017 for objecting to illegal practices, brought the case under the False Claims Act. Acadia paid $19.85 million in September 2024, including $16.5 million to the federal government and $3 million to four states. Federal investigations into the company's more recent practices are ongoing, with FBI and HHS Inspector General agents interviewing former employees. |
| ZI | ZoomInfo Technologies Inc. | ZoomInfo Technologies commercialized individuals' names, professional identities, work histories, job titles, business addresses, and partial contact information without consent to advertise and sell subscriptions to its database platform. A class action filed under state right-of-publicity laws in California, Illinois, Indiana, and Nevada resulted in a $29.55 million settlement approved by the court in November 2024. The California class received $14.2 million, the Illinois class $11.7 million, Indiana $2.3 million, and Nevada $1.3 million. Under the settlement terms, ZoomInfo is prohibited from using any class member's identity to advertise its products going forward. The business model of harvesting and monetizing personal professional data without consent represents a systematic privacy violation at commercial scale. |
| AXON | Axon Enterprise, Inc. | Axon Enterprise manufactures and sells Taser conducted energy devices responsible for over 1,000 deaths in the United States since 2000, according to Reuters investigations. The company faced at least 442 lawsuits from families of Taser-related deaths as of 2017, with many cases alleging the devices were marketed as non-lethal despite known cardiac risks. Axon (then TASER International) historically fought liability aggressively, spending millions to defend product claims while people continued to die from Taser-induced cardiac arrest. In 2025, the company began developing covert Taser weapons marketed to corporate executives, extending the weaponization of its core product line into private civilian markets. The product carries inherent lethal risk that the company has systematically downplayed for decades. |
| TMDX | TRANSMEDICS GROUP INC | Scorpion Capital published a detailed investigative report in January 2025 alleging that TransMedics conceals adverse data on rejected organs processed through its National OCS Program (NOP) and misrepresents clinical outcomes to investors and regulators. The report, based on over 30 interviews with former employees, surgeons, and organ procurement organizations, alleges TransMedics engages in kickbacks to transplant centers in exchange for using its Organ Care System, steers damaged organs rejected by reputable centers to favored users, and conceals organ quality information to protect device and aircraft fees. Multiple securities class action lawsuits have been filed. A Senate hearing examined organ transplant safety concerns related to TransMedics' practices. The stock dropped 13% on the report's release. |
| SBUX | Starbucks Corporation | Starbucks Corporation has faced repeated legal and community challenges over its market expansion tactics, which critics and plaintiffs have characterized as predatory. A 2016 antitrust lawsuit alleged the company engaged in anticompetitive practices, including offering to pay property leases above market rates to secure prime retail locations and exclude competitors. This followed a history of community opposition, such as in San Diego's Ocean Beach neighborhood in 2014, where over 500 residents organized against a proposed store, accusing the company of undermining local character. For decades, from New York City pushcart disputes in 2002 to present-day criticisms, the company has been accused of employing a market saturation strategy that systematically targets and displaces independent local cafes. |
| ATGE | Adtalem Global Education Inc. | DeVry University, then owned by Adtalem Global Education, systematically misrepresented graduate employment outcomes to recruit students. The FTC found DeVry falsely claimed 90% of graduates seeking employment landed jobs in their field within six months and that bachelor's graduates earned 15% more than peers from other universities. In December 2016, DeVry agreed to a $100 million FTC settlement, comprising $49.4 million in cash refunds to harmed students and $50.6 million in debt relief. The U.S. Department of Education subsequently approved $415 million in borrower defense discharges covering approximately 19,000 DeVry claims in February 2022. The company rebranded from DeVry Education Group to Adtalem Global Education in 2017. ViolationTracker documents the pattern of consumer deception. |
+ 42 more companies excluded under this screen
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