Amazon blames social media sites for allowing 'fake reviews' industry to boom

Fake reviews on e-commerce platforms havebecome one of the most persistent issues that online retailers across the globe have been facing over the past few years. A "cottage industry of fraudsters" has mushroomed on social media platforms and messaging apps, making the shopping experience, a nightmare, for both consumers as well as retailers.

Amazon, one of the biggest e-retailers in the game, had to block over 200 million fake reviews last year to keep the platform sanitised. It reported more than 23,000 groups that added fake reviews, with more than 46 million members, to social media platforms.

The company says the fake reviews were harming customers who are being "deceived about products they should or shouldn't be purchasing".

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According toDharmesh Mehta, head of the company’s customer trust team, it is a vicious cycle where these fraudsters are playing both galleries.

“They go to sellers and on the nefarious side say: ‘I can get you fake reviews’ – but many offer it as a marketing service and end up duping a small business who don’t know what is going on behind the scenes," Mehta told The Guardian.

“Then they go to a bunch of consumers and say: ‘Hey, if you leave a five-star review for this product, I’ll give it to you for free or a £25 gift card.’ So, they’re effectively buying a customer’s review on one side, and on the other hand, selling a marketing or review service to a brand or manufacturer," he added.

Amazon, Google receive rap on the knuckles

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA),a UK-based competition watchdog had last year accused the likes of Amazon and Google of not doing enough to nip the problem in the bud.

“Our worry is that millions of online shoppers could be misled by reading fake reviews and then spending their money based on those recommendations,”said Andrea Coscelli, the chief executive of the CMA.

“Equally, it’s simply not fair if some businesses can fake five-star reviews to give their products or services the most prominence while law-abiding businesses lose out.”

Since then, the Jeff Bezos-owned platform has taken the lead in clipping the wings of fake reviewers. It has invested in machine learning models to detect fraudulent behaviour.

"We use machine learning to look for suspicious accounts, to track the relationships between a purchasing account that's leaving a review and someone selling that product," said Mehta.

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However, the company argues that social media platforms are extremely sluggish when it comes to acting on the intel provided. Amazon said it sued more than 10,000 Facebook group administrators who were found running fake review farms. When quizzed about the rampant presence of such groups on its platform, Meta said it continues to "invest in new technologies and methods to protect our users from this kind of content”.

(With inputs from agencies)

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