The issue of fake reviews on e-commerce platforms has become a persistent problem for online retailers worldwide in recent years, causing nightmares for both consumers and retailers. This has led to the emergence of a “cottage industry of fraudsters” on social media platforms and messaging apps.
Amazon, as one of the largest e-retailers, had to take action to combat this problem by blocking over 200 million fake reviews last year in order to maintain a clean platform. It identified more than 23,000 groups with over 46 million members that were responsible for posting fake reviews on social media.
The presence of fake reviews on the platform was harming customers who were being deceived about the products they were considering purchasing, according to Dharmesh Mehta, head of Amazon’s customer trust team. He described it as a vicious cycle where fraudsters played both sides.
The fraudsters approached sellers, offering fake reviews as a service, and often duped unsuspecting small businesses. On the other hand, they targeted consumers, incentivizing them to leave positive reviews in exchange for free products or gift cards. This allowed them to buy customer reviews while simultaneously selling marketing or review services to brands and manufacturers.
The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), a UK-based competition watchdog, reprimanded Amazon and Google for not doing enough to address the problem. The CMA expressed concerns that millions of online shoppers could be misled by fake reviews, leading to unfair advantages for some businesses and losses for law-abiding ones.
In response, Amazon took steps to tackle fake reviewers, investing in machine learning models to detect fraudulent behavior. The company uses machine learning to identify suspicious accounts and track relationships between purchasing accounts and product sellers.
While Amazon has taken action, it argues that social media platforms are slow to respond to the information provided. Amazon filed lawsuits against over 10,000 Facebook group administrators involved in running fake review farms. Social media giant Meta (formerly Facebook) stated that it continues to invest in new technologies and methods to protect users from such content.
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