Zeta Global (NYSE: ZETA) CEO David Steinberg is Now Lying on CNBC About Zeta Global Consent Farms

The writing is on the wall for ZETA. Also, a piece of paper saying "ZETA HQ" seems to be quite literally taped on the wall.

On Wednesday, November 27, 2024 during CNBC's Closing Bell: Overtime, Zeta Global CEO David Steinberg again publicly, unequivocally lied about Zeta Global's use of "consent farms" for Zeta Global data collection about consumers.

This is equivalent to the CEO of McDonald's going on CNBC and stating that McDonald's does not sell hamburgers.

As we've gone over recently, Zeta Global not only operates consent farms but operates them today, even after they claimed in a November 20 investor presentation they do not operate these businesses:

-On November 22, we went over how Zeta is operating "giveaway sweepstakes" through their ArcaMax property through November, 2024 and we went over how signupconfirmed.com is another Zeta-run consent farm.

-On November 25, we went over this "Fresh Career Finder" consent farm and traced through how other consent farms advertise jobs on this consent farm.

David Steinberg and Zeta Global Board Members not only run a company operating consent farms, but also they run venture investment firm Caivis to seed and help create consent farming opportunities.

What the Heck is this 'Caivis' Operation?

As of the morning of November 29, 2024, the Caivis website has had all its content removed - concerning, given that on November 27, David Steinberg was on CNBC and his role at Caivis was prominently displayed in the interview.

Using the Wayback Machine, we can see that before the site content recently went down, the Caivis Board is just quite literally Zeta Global's CEO and three of Zeta Global's Board Members.

This separate investment arm is essentially just an extension of Zeta Global.

Using the Wayback Machine, we can also see a number of companies that Caivis has invested in, which include consent farms.

One of these farms is USA Rx - a service which gives away "free" discounts on prescription drugs in exchange for giving USA Rx your personal data.

USA Rx is Just Another Zeta-Affiliated Consent Farm, Though Instead of Baiting Consumers with Job Openings or Sweepstakes They Offer Free Pharmacy Discount Cards

We can look through the history of USA Rx to see how this changes over time.

As of 2016, the path was:

1) Input the medications you are taking to find an offer on USA Rx

2) Input your data to sign up for texts or emails

3) Go to your pharmacist to see if the coupon will work

There's no guarantee of any of this working, nor any database linking the consumer to whether or not they can get the discount.

It's obvious the whole point is for a consumer to input all the medications they are taking, link this to identifiers (phone number, email address, browser data/IP address) that identify who the consumer is in order to make lead lists.

Today, this company is even worse - now they are doing affiliate marketing.

Influencers can sign up with USA Rx, write content online about USA Rx and how great it is, and sign up consumers for these discount cards for payment.

Today, in 2024, you have the chance to "Earn Big" with "Your Very Own Pharmacy Side Hustle"

These "pharmacy discount cards" have come under fire in recent years, and will likely continue to come under fire, even under a new administration.

The FTC went after GoodRx in 2023 for sharing GoodRx user data with Google, Facebook, and other organizations.

Further, a number of industry groups and attorney general offices have in the past few years published warnings about "pharmacy discount cards" marketed to consumers.

This "pharmacy discount card" business model does not work without the sharing or selling of consumer data on the back end, especially for "free" cards.

Conclusion

David Steinberg, CEO of Zeta Global, is absolutely lying when he said he "didn't even know what a consent farm was" on CNBC this week. This is a materially false statement about what Zeta Global is and how it operates.

Zeta Global's business relies on these consent farms, and has for years. Zeta Global operates on the underbelly of the internet, as I've shown over multiple articles since October, 2024.

1. On October 11, I discussed how Zeta Global uses low-quality political blogs and election prediction market PredictIt for comments section data collection through the Disqus product and why Zeta Global’s ‘Zeta 2025 Plan’ aligns Zeta equity value to coincide with the 2024 US election cycle.
2. On October 15, I discussed how Zeta Global leaked the data of ~15,000 Zeta customers and prospects by failing to secure customer data and leaving it exposed on the open, public internet. We went over how we can use Zeta’s leaked data to proxy which customers are among Zeta’s largest.
3. On October 18, Barclays downgraded ZETA, moving the stock rating from Overweight to Equal weight with a price target of $28.00.
4. On October 21, I discussed how Zeta Global runs a comically ridiculous business called “Aptroid” and has filled Aptroid’s website with fraudulent marketing claims. We also went over how there is almost nothing at all to Zeta Global’s “AI” story and how Zeta is using Snowflake (NYSE: SNOW) for a white label in addition to reselling Snowflake, thus “double dipping” on customers.
5. On October 25, I covered how Zeta Global has been manipulating revenue guidance through creative wordsmithing in order to dupe investors into believing certain election revenue is not cyclical, thus giving a rosier picture of sustainable revenue growth.
6. On November 22, I dove into some of the false claims Zeta Global CEO David Steinberg and CFO Chris Greiner have made in the past two weeks on their cover-your-a** tour after ZETA has tanked.
7. On November 25, I dove into how Zeta Global uses robocalling/SMS spam, consent farming, and fake job opportunities and sweepstakes to harvest consumer data used to build their identity graph. Zeta Global is merely a lead list generator - a far cry from their claims of being an "AI" play.

I believe ZETA remains a Strong Sell as Zeta Global CEO David Steinberg continues to intentionally, publicly, and directly lie to investors about the existence of Zeta Global's consent farm networks.

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This content is provided for informational purposes only, and should not be relied upon as legal, business, investment, or tax advice. You should consult your own advisers as to those matters. Lauren Balik does not represent the interests of any fund or of any investor other than herself. Past performance is not indicative of future results. This content speaks only as of the date published. Any projections, estimates, forecasts, targets, and/or opinions expressed in these materials are subject to change without notice and may differ or be contrary to opinions expressed by others.