In a significant legal victory, Marriott International, Inc. (Marriott) has successfully concluded a lawsuit in federal court in Virginia against perpetrators responsible for tens of millions of illegal and fraudulent robocalls to consumers, misusing the Marriott name and the names of its portfolio of brands. Marriott initially filed the case as a “John Doe” lawsuit in May 2021, against anonymous bad actors who were exploiting Marriott’s brands for their own commercial gain and violating both state and federal laws.
The entities behind these unlawful robocalls persuaded consumers to purchase vacation and timeshare promotions, falsely claiming to be agents or employees of, or otherwise affiliated with, Marriott. The volume of illegal robocalls fraudulently claiming to be from Marriott surged dramatically in 2020, peaking at seven million per month, with some consumers often subjected to the harassment of repeated robocalls, frustrating both consumers and the company.
In support of its consumer and brand protection efforts, Marriott retained technology specialists YouMail and the Industry Traceback Group , which tracked robocalls using Marriott’s marks, thereby enabling the company to identify entities originating the robocalls. After issuing dozens of subpoenas, Marriott amended its lawsuit in 2022 to add ten named domestic and foreign defendants. Over the past two years, Marriott has obtained judgments, consent orders, or settlements against all six of the U.S.-based defendants and has continued to pursue claims against two foreign defendants.
On September 23, 2024, Marriott secured judgments against two foreign defendants — Cancun Ink Corp. S.A. de C.V., a Mexico-based telemarketer, and Deep Blue Desarrollos S. de R.L. de C.V., a Mexican timeshare resort that previously conducted business as Vallarta Gardens and has now rebranded to Kovay Gardens. The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia awarded statutory damages and issued a broad injunction against these defendants and those “in active concert or participation” with them. The Court found that these defendants collectively owe Marriott $8 million in damages for wrongfully using its trademarks in more than 66 million robocalls between 2018 and 2022.
“While we pursued this litigation to protect our trademarks, our primary objective in the suit was to protect customers from unlawful, harassing and deceptive robocalls,” said Rena Hozore Reiss, Executive Vice President and General Counsel for Marriott International. “We are pleased with the outcome of the case.”
“In working with Marriott, we were able to help identify certain entities originating fraudulent robocalls and provide evidence of the scale and effect of these robocall campaigns,” said Alex Quilici, CEO, YouMail. “We are pleased that our collaboration helped address a frustrating issue for Marriott, its customers, and everyone getting those calls.”
