FTC v. Nuvei: A $4.85 Million Lesson for Payment Processors That Serve Tech Support Telemarketers

The bottom line: the FTC is going after the payment side of telemarketing schemes, not just the callers.

What happened

The defendants are Nuvei Corporation and four affiliated companies: Nuvei International Group Limited, Nuvei Limited, SafeCharge Digital Limited (SafeCharge) and Nuvei Technologies Inc. The FTC alleges that all of them acted as a common enterprise.

According to the FTC complaint, Reimage (also known as Restoro) used deceptive pop-up ads designed to look like system warnings from Microsoft to trick consumers into thinking their computers were compromised. Users were then induced to purchase “repair” software for $30 to $60 and call a toll-free number. The telemarketers that answered allegedly posed as technology support specialists who had accessed the consumers’ computers and found “serious issues.” The FTC further alleges that the callers then persuaded customers to purchase “repair” services, typically beginning around $300, $400, and $500. The FTC sued Reimage's operators in 2024 and obtained a stipulated order with a $26 million judgment.

The complaint alleges that Nuvei knew or should have known about the fraud, noting that:

• Internal reviews in 2015 through 2017 revealed that Reimage’s chargebacks greatly exceeded the 1 percent level typical for card networks, averaging as high as 8.5 percent for Discover payments;
• In January 2019, according to the FTC, a Mastercard audit identified Reimage as a “scam;”
• Microsoft performed a test purchase in early 2020 and confirmed the deceptive pop-up alerts, after which Visa sent Nuvei Limited a violation notice in March 2020 and, in May 2020, issued a fine of 25,000 euros;
• After these interventions, Nuvei allegedly increased its processing for Reimage, including facilitating automatic renewals of subscriptions.

The FTC complaint further reports that beginning with the Microsoft report in March 2020, Nuvei processed more than 115,000 Reimage transactions worth more than $9.5 million.

How the payments were allegedly hidden

The FTC describes three ways Nuvei allegedly evaded detection by the card networks.

First, the complaint alleges that Nuvei engaged in “load balancing” by distributing a merchant’s sales across multiple accounts to avoid the chargeback limits for any one account. The FTC cites an email from the head of risk management at Nuvei Limited, which states, “We will manage, will split their traffic with more banks.”

Second, the FTC alleges that Nuvei misclassified Reimage as a computer software store (MCC 5734) rather than a telemarketer (MCC 5966) despite the company’s own policies. According to the FTC, Nuvei processed more than 35,200 charges of $299 or more for Reimage's remote tech support, totaling over $15.6 million during the period from January 1, 2017 through October 31, 2022.

Third, the complaint alleges that Nuvei used “false applications” to present Reimage as a legitimate business. According to the FTC, the applications identified a paid nominee director as the owner of Reimage and a business address in the Isle of Man while the company operated from Israel and had call centers in the Philippines and India. The FTC further alleges that Nuvei processed Reimage payments using “merchant of record” arrangements that allowed an intermediary company to represent the seller. The FTC also alleges that Nuvei Technologies Inc., the U.S. subsidiary in Arizona, opened accounts for merchants selling business opportunities with false earnings claims, merchants impersonating government tax authorities, and merchants previously terminated by other processors for chargebacks or fraud.

You can read the full allegations in the FTC complaint against Nuvei.

The law

This is not a Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) case. The FTC brought two claims.

The first alleges unfair payment processing practices under Section 5 of the FTC Act, 15 U.S.C. § 45(a). The second alleges that Nuvei violated the Telemarketing Sales Rule (TSR) by assisting and facilitating violations of the TSR.

Under 16 C.F.R. § 310.3(b), a processor violates the TSR if it provides “substantial assistance or support” to a seller or telemarketer that it knows or “consciously avoids knowing” is violating the TSR. According to the FTC, one of those violations was misrepresentation to induce payment.

The key phrase is “consciously avoids knowing.” If there are red flags, acting as though they are not there is not an option.

The settlement

These are allegations, and the case was resolved with a stipulated order, which the Commission approved by a 2-0 vote. Under the order, Nuvei will pay $4.85 million for consumer redress. The order also provides that:

• Nuvei is permanently prohibited from providing payment processing services to any seller of tech support by telephone or through deceptive pop-up security or performance alerts;
• The company is also prohibited from making false statements to obtain merchant accounts or employing any tactics to circumvent bank or card network fraud monitoring systems, including “load balancing;” and
• The company is required to conduct screening and monitoring of its present and future clients for compliance with the order, including those that engage in outbound telemarketing, and to apply enhanced scrutiny to any clients that have chargeback levels that exceed the limitations set forth in the order.

The FTC’s press release about the Nuvei case highlights the key aspects of the order.

Why it matters

Liability for telemarketing violations is spreading outward. The FTC filed the original case against Reimage in 2024. The FTC also filed a similar complaint against another payment processor, Paddle, in connection with the same scheme. By bringing this case against Nuvei, the FTC is continuing its crackdown on the entire calling chain. Each level of the chain may face liability if it takes part in a deceptive calling campaign, whether through payment processing or other means.

The message is the same one we see in TCPA vicarious liability cases. If you profit from the calls and you have reason to know they are deceptive, you share the risk.

What this means for your business

1. Classify merchants accurately. Nuvei allegedly coded Reimage as a software store rather than a telemarketer. If a merchant conducts any outbound telemarketing, classify it that way.
2. Treat chargebacks as a warning sign. Chargeback rates above 1 percent should raise red flags. If you see them consistently, you cannot ignore them.
3. Do not “balance” volume across accounts to stay under limits. The order in this case expressly prohibits it, and the complaint pleads it as an unfair practice.
4. Verify what merchants tell you. Nominee directors and mismatches between where a company is registered and where it actually operates are obvious red flags. If in doubt, investigate.
5. Take third-party warnings seriously. If a card network, a bank or a brand owner asks you to stop processing payments for a particular company, act on it.

This was an expensive lesson. Investigate suspicious merchants and act on what you find.