Tuesday saw the announcement of a joint effort by some of the most popular travel and shopping websites to combat bogus reviews.
In a statement, travel agencies Expedia Group, Booking.com, and Tripadvisor, as well as online retailers Amazon, Glassdoor, and Trustpilot, announced the formation of a coalition to defend access to “trustworthy consumer reviews” around the globe.
According to the corporations, the members of the association, which will be known as the Coalition for Trusted Reviews, will search for best practices for hosting online reviews and exchange strategies for spotting bogus ones. This will entail creating guidelines for what counts as a false review and exchanging knowledge about the tactics used by dishonest people.
Despite their best efforts, fake reviews have long plagued internet markets. A significant portion of the issue is caused by brokers who ask for bogus customer evaluations via social media sites, encrypted messaging apps, and other platforms in exchange for cash, gifts, or other advantages. Brokers might ask for good feedback to increase business or seller sales. They can even write derogatory reviews for rival businesses to ruin their sales.
After utilizing messaging apps to promote and sell fraudulent reviews to Amazon selling accounts, two review brokers in China were found guilty and given sentences of 2.5 years in prison and 3 years of probation last month, according to Amazon. The business has brought numerous such cases in the last year against operators who it claims were engaging in similar behavior. Additionally, it sued the administrators of more than 10,000 Facebook groups last year, alleging that they had organized fake reviews in exchange for cash or free goods.
The British consumer advocacy group “Which” also found earlier this year that Facebook groups were swapping reviews for Google and Trustpilot, which allows people to offer feedback for businesses.
Federal officials have also vowed to take action against fake reviews that are intended to mislead customers. The Federal Trade Commission put up a new proposal in June that, among other things, would make it illegal for companies to sell or buy fraudulent reviews, censor genuine reviews, or offer fake social media activity.
Businesses would also be forbidden from founding or running a website that portrays itself as offering unbiased reviews of its goods, as well as from engaging in other practices like “review hijacking,” which makes reviews for one product appear to have been written for others. If the plan is approved, those who violate it may be punished.
In a statement that was included in the news release, Becky Foley, Tripadvisor’s vice president for trust and safety, declared that the coalition’s “immediate area of focus” will be on battling those responsible for fabricating reviews.
Robust cooperation is even more crucial because “these actors frequently operate outside of jurisdictions with legal frameworks to stop fraudulent activity,” according to Foley.
The businesses claimed that the coalition was born out of discussions that transpired at Tripadvisor’s “Fake Reviews” conference, which was hosted in San Francisco last year. They stated that they will get together in early December at a second meeting that Amazon will host in Brussels.
