"PresentingCBS", "Johnny Polanco" and ClearSlide

[wserra]

We get cold calls from so-called "lawyer referral services" all the time. They usually begin with something like, "We are not a lawyer referral service" - meaning, of course, that they really are. It is unethical for a lawyer to split a legal fee with a non-lawyer, so these calls tend to be bottom-feeders trolling for bottom-feeding lawyers. Some of them have show arrangements like a lawyer who has lent his/her name to the referral service - unethical too, of course. We hang up as soon as we realize the call is from one of these folks.

Earlier today I got a call from someone who identified himself as "Johnny Polanco" from "CBS". I have been interviewed on TV a few times, and there are a few print reporters who will call me for reaction to various legal stories. I thought this was the same sort of thing, so I took the call. The guy says that CBS is starting a lawyer referral service, with assets like people "in St. Luke's Hospital" (St. Luke's-Roosevelt is a major NYC teaching hospital). I ask if he is talking about the "CBS television network", and "Johnny" assures me that he is. I express disbelief that the real CBS is starting a lawyer referral service. He says he'll prove it to me: "Just go to http://www.presentingCBS.com" (he actually wanted me to include his referral, but I didn't bother). Lo and behold, presentingCBS.com aliases to ClearSlide.com, a company that "innovates with the latest technology to deliver an all-in-one product that turns sales people into superstars". I, of course, hang up on "Superstar Johnny".

presentingCBS.com registered through GoDaddy, where a whois check turns up the registrant: Domains by Proxy. Of course.

Even for NYC, this was pretty blatant.