I would love to know what is in the famous "Lakeland essence". It's a secret though. Very intriguing.
How I look at this flavoring thing is that if there is no flavoring mentioned then it is not likely to dominate. I accept that some form of casing is in place most of the time, but it complements the natural flavors of the leaf instead of dominating it. Isn't a fraud in my opinion, just part of processing tobacco to make it smokable.
Talk about fraud: many whisky manufacturers add caramel coloring to their whisky to make it look like it's more "aged" than it really is (makes it more brownish/amber). And they usually won't mention it unless required by law, and it usually isn't. Now that's fradulent in my opinion as it doesn't improve the product but just creates a faulty image to the customer.