BATON ROUGE, LA – Louisiana
Attorney General Jeff Landry has joined a bipartisan coalition of 45 attorneys
general in urging Twitter, eBay, and Shopify to act immediately in preventing
people from marketing and selling blank or fraudulently completed COVID vaccine
cards bearing the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention logo on their
platforms.
“The use of your platform to
disseminate the deceptive marketing and sales of fake vaccine cards is a threat
to residents of our states,” said Attorney General Landry and his colleagues in
letters to the big tech giants. “As a result, we are asking you to take
immediate action to prevent your platform from being used as a vehicle to
commit these fraudulent and deceptive acts that harm our communities.”
Legitimate vaccination cards are
given by providers when they administer the vaccine. People who buy fake cards
can have their own information added to the card or add it in themselves, so it
appears they have been vaccinated when they have not.
“The false and deceptive marketing
and sales of fake COVID vaccine cards threatens the health of our communities,
slows progress in getting our residents protected from the virus, and is a
violation of the laws of many states,” added Attorney General Landry.
Attorney General Landry and his
colleagues requested the Big Tech CEOs:
- Monitor their platforms
for ads or links marketing or selling, or otherwise indicating the
availability of, blank or fraudulently completed vaccine cards;
- Promptly take down ads
or links identified through that monitoring;
- Preserve records – such as the content, username, and actual user identity – pertaining to any such ads or links.
Additionally, Attorney General
Landry once again encouraged consumers to report COVID scams to the National
Center for Disaster Fraud by calling 866-720-5721 or filing an online complaint
at www.justice.gov/DisasterComplaintForm.
Attorney General Landry is joined
in sending this bipartisan letter by the Attorneys General of North Carolina,
Tennessee, Alaska, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, the
District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Guam, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky,
Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nebraska, Nevada, New
Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Northern Mariana
Islands, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina,
South Dakota, Utah, Vermont, Virgin Islands, Virginia, Washington, West
Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming.