A creditor (credit card company, bank, physician, etc.) assigns or sells a debt for collections to a third party debt collector or debt buyer, the debt collector further assigns the debt to a law firm. The law firm is representing the 3rd party debt collector, but uses the original creditors name (trademarked name) in filing suit.
It is Trademark Infringement Folks
The law firm is not directly representing the original creditor and doesn’t have direct consent of the creditor to file suit (remember they were employed by the third party assignee or debt buyer).
This is trademark infringement and companies reputations and names are being tarnished by misuse of their names. Not only that it is dilution of their brand and causing much consumer confusion.
If you look at it another way these third party to a third party law firms are using the companies tradename to benefit financially (used in commerce).

Hmmm. Well, speaking in the abstract, if a trademark licensee says “I am trademark owner” as opposed to “I am trademark owner’s licensee,’ that may be problematic (however there is such a thing as a trading name license). Consumer debt colection is heavily regulated – there may well be state regulations governing how the debt collector identifies itself that cover this issue. However here the article is suggesting that a law firm is mis-identifying its client. You would likely want to go the professional responsibility statute to analyze that one first.
However, it seems that the law firm HAS to identify the trademark owner is some way. How else would the consumer know which debt is being collected? (as to whether a law firm can threaten suit when it has not been authorized to do again is not a trademark issue).

Hard to believe, but the CNN Twitter account racing Ashton Kutcher to 1 million subscribers wasn’t even under CNN’s (TWX) control until recently.
CNN has taken control of the @cnnbrkaccount — and its 944,000 followers — we’ve heard. We don’t know the transaction details, and are waiting to hear back from CNN to confirm the deal and any details

More details from TechCrunch.

. . . .Though the walk-about “Dora” had the expected pageboy haircut and backpack, her expression was blank and her legs appeared out of proportion to the rest of her body. “When Dora came out,” Mrs. Sorkin says, “none of the kids would go to Dora, including my daughter, and a few of the kids started crying.”
Elvira Grau, who owns Space Odyssey USA, where Mrs. Sorkin held her daughter’s party, says the costume companies that service her parties try to make their costumes look sufficiently different from the trademarked characters to avoid lawsuits. When Mrs. Sorkin complained to her that Dora was “hideous,” Mrs. Grau gave her a $250 credit. “But I told her, ‘You can’t have the real Dora. If you want the real Dora, call Nickelodeon.’ ”

Every sentence in this article is both funny and extremely sad.
There is a sentiment expressed by Justice Stevens in Moseley v V Secret, that where there is no confusion, a tarnishing use reflects on the tarnisher and not the trademark owner. It might be the case that where there is no confusion that the local children’s clown is ‘licensed’ by anyone, that if the clown stumbles around drunk or otherwise behaves inappropriately, in a character costume, that that reflects on the clown, and not on the costume.
Comment away.

[Navarro of Jane's Addiction] has received a rather stern letter from the Vuitton legal team saying in part that: “We have no doubt that this copying has been willful and is intended to trade upon the fame and cachet of the LV Trademarks to elevate the status of the infringing Guitar Strap, and of Jane’s Addiction.”

“Since 2000, Plaintiff has been engaged in the commercial entertainment distribution industry. Plaintiff formerly sold and rented edited movies. Plaintiff currently rents unedited movies via an online business. Until recently, Defendant sold and rented edited movies. This case is about Defendant falsely representing himself to be a founder, owner, franchisee, or dealer of Clean Flicks or otherwise affiliated with Clean Flicks.
. . .
Since on or about 4 December 2007, numerous news stories have appeared identifying Defendant as “CleanFlicks Founder”, “co-founder of CleanFlicks”, “Former ‘Clean Flix’ owner”, “the owner of ‘Clean Flix’, the company that edited R-rated movies and was recently closed down by Hollywood lawyers”, “a former Clean Flicks franchisee”, “a franchise operator for Clean Flicks”, a man who “used to own four Clean Flicks franchises”, a man who “at one time ran a successful Clean Flicks store”, a man who “formerly operated Clean Flix – a business in Orem that edited feature films to remove or alter conduct deemed inappropriate for children”, and “a former dealer of edited movies with CleanFlicks”. Each of these statements is false.”

Clean Flicks Media, Inc. v. Daniel Dean Thompson, 2:08-cv-00086-PMW (D Utah (Central) Feb 1 2008).