an ai company sold small businesses a bot that would close their sales for them. the ftc banned the owners from selling business opportunities in march, entered an $18 million judgment, then suspended most of it because there was nothing left to collect.

the ftc's order describes the standard shape: a tool wrapped in an income promise, a refund policy that did not survive contact with a refund request, and buyers who paid up front for a business rather than for work. the money is mostly unrecoverable, which is the part worth internalizing, because a suspended judgment means the regulator agreed you were robbed and also that you are not getting paid. this category is expanding right now, since anyone can put a chat window on a landing page and call it infrastructure, and the demos are excellent because demos are the only thing they build.

the fake fix is more diligence on the technology, watching the demo twice, asking about the model. the technology is not what fails. run one test instead: make the seller name a number already in your p&l, say how much it moves and by when, and give you two customers in your industry who have run it for six months. if the pitch is the income and not the work, it is a business-opportunity scheme with a chatbot on the front, and the ftc will get to it about eighteen months after your card clears.