Amazon looks to shut down fake customer review sites
Amazon has filed lawsuits against two fake customer review brokers, AppSally and Rebatest, who, the e-commerce giant claims, helped mislead shoppers by having their members try to post on the likes of Amazon, eBay, Walmart, and Etsy.
“Fake review brokers attempt to profit by deceiving unknowing consumers and creating an unfair competitive advantage that harms our selling partners,” says Dharmesh Mehta, VP of WW Customer Trust & Partner Support, Amazon.
“We know how valuable trustworthy reviews are to our customers. That is why we are holding these review fraudsters accountable. While we prevent millions of suspicious reviews from ever appearing in our store, these lawsuits target the source.”
The legal action comes after an investigation into these review brokers, which taken together claim to have more than 900,000 members willing to write fake reviews.
AppSally sells fake reviews for as low as at $20 and instructs bad actors to ship empty boxes to people willing to write fake reviews, and to provide AppSally with photos to be uploaded alongside their reviews.
The scheme run by Rebatest will only pay people writing five star reviews after they are approved by the bad actors attempting to sell those items.
Amazon says that it has more than 10,000 employees around the world protecting its store from fraud and abuse.
It receives more than 30 million reviews each week, and uses a combination of machine learning technology and skilled investigators to analyse each review before it is displayed.
In 2021, Amazon also reported over 16,000 abusive groups to social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, resulting in groups with over 11 million members being taken down.
