The Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids discusses the U.S. Department of Justice’s historic lawsuit against tobacco companies in 1999, in which the Department accused the companies of attempting to hide the health effects of smoking and second-hand smoking for decades. In 2006, these companies were found guilty of committing fraud for misleading the public and violating the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act. This ruling meant that the court required tobacco companies to publicly advertise “corrective statements” disclosing the hazards associated with smoking tobacco products and the deceptive marketing in which they engaged. Such deceptive marketing included the tobacco industry’s propaganda on the negative consequences of smoking, nicotine addiction, the absence of positive effects of “light” cigarettes, and the deliberate design of cigarettes to give maximum nicotine intake. These corrective statements were released through multiple platforms like television and newspaper adverts, the companies’ websites, and the cigarette packs themselves.
This precedent further reinforces how much effort the tobacco companies have put into misleading the public, as well as the significance of the government’s intervention to stop such dishonest advertising.