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Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

theguardian.com

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Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#51

Post by randycupertino »

bingbingo wrote: post #4

Shit like this is what made me lose confidence in Amazon and I stopped my prime subscription. My wife bought me “luxury” branded jackets and clothing for fall. Half of them were counterfeit. I called Amazon and they said I can return them and they’ll send me new ones. Ok. How will I know those won’t be counterfeit? Worse, I found a jacket was counterfeit after the return period when it literally started to fall apart…

We basically stopped getting any products that go on or in your body from Amazon due to the pervasiveness of fake products on there. Tons of fake makeup, shampoos, vitamins, electronics. imo Amazon is worse than ebay lately with the amount of counterfeit goods.

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#52

Post by mcpherrinm »

giancarlostoro wrote: post #45
toss1 wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd say of unmoderated (or poorly moderated) review systems. E.g., we don't see this on Angie's List or Houzz. I've found that the only way to get useful information out of most Amazon reviews is to look at the 1- & 2-stars, trying to filter out the fake competitor hits, and see if there are any consistent issues that aren't DEU issues. Then look at the 3- & 4-stars and see what seems to be good. That said, I expect…

Another factor is reviews with pictures depending on what you are buying. In any case I cancelled Amazon prime. They wont be getting my money once my membership expires. I rather pay for a service thats worthwhile to me. I rather get my things at Walmart or BestBuy due to convenience and now BestBuy will price match Amazon.

For all the problems that Amazon has, there is a long history of Best Buy actively pushing consumer-harmful practises that I would still rate them a lower choice.

The first one that comes to mind is forcing printer manufacturers to not bundle USB cables so they can separately sell them at a high markup

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#53

Post by dangwu »

toss1 wrote: post #36
astrodust wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only way to describe this is as an unfortunate inevitability of review systems as a whole.

I'd say of unmoderated (or poorly moderated) review systems. E.g., we don't see this on Angie's List or Houzz. I've found that the only way to get useful information out of most Amazon reviews is to look at the 1- & 2-stars, trying to filter out the fake competitor hits, and see if there are any consistent issues that aren't DEU issues. Then look at the 3- & 4-stars and see what seems to be good. That said, I expect…

If people wanted to fake review Angie's List or Houzz, they would do it.

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#54

Post by randycupertino »

staticassertion wrote: post #47
plink wrote: post #2

I feel unaffected by such fake reviews as the only ones I ascribe much value to are the negative ones. Also, I've extremely curtailed any purchasing on Amazon as I've come to perceive the majority of their marketplace to be a degenerative crap house.

Competitors will pay for fake reviews. I know a friend who gets offers to do this in exchange for discounted goods.

That reminds me of this video about the beauty industry. Brands will pay influencers $15k for a shoutout or good review about their brand, but will pay upwards of $60k for a disparaging review of their competitors brands:

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/makeup-artist-accuses-cosmeti...

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#55

Post by dcbadacd »

toss1 wrote: post #36
astrodust wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only way to describe this is as an unfortunate inevitability of review systems as a whole.

I'd say of unmoderated (or poorly moderated) review systems. E.g., we don't see this on Angie's List or Houzz. I've found that the only way to get useful information out of most Amazon reviews is to look at the 1- & 2-stars, trying to filter out the fake competitor hits, and see if there are any consistent issues that aren't DEU issues. Then look at the 3- & 4-stars and see what seems to be good. That said, I expect…

I'd say this is exactly where some kind of web of trust could work. Meaning that everyone is shown the reviews of their added family members, their trusted people (with less weight) and so on and on. If they betray the trust the system could even have a "trust less" button. It'd actually give people the ability to choose who they trust.

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#56

Post by reagan83 »

Regardsyjc wrote: post #43
amelius wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I feel unaffected by such fake reviews as the only ones I ascribe much value to are the negative ones. I suppose fake review factories can be hired just as well to make the competition look bad ...

Fake negative reviews are a tactic of nasty competitors. I'm an Amazon seller and they are rampant. The more competitive the category you're in, the nastier it gets. They will bomb you with negative reviews using certain keywords that will trigger an Amazon algorithm to shut you down. Amazon has a few systems in place for QC, things like 6% negative customer experience rate or certain keywords like counterfeit or rel…

Great insight - what services do you use to watch your own & other sellers? Been meaning to write software in this space for a while. Feel free to dm me email is in profile.

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#57

Post by Lewton »

pmcollins wrote: post #42
plink wrote: post #2

I feel unaffected by such fake reviews as the only ones I ascribe much value to are the negative ones. Also, I've extremely curtailed any purchasing on Amazon as I've come to perceive the majority of their marketplace to be a degenerative crap house.

I bought a problematic item on Amazon and left a negative review. The seller contacted me three times via email and offered me $30 (the cost of the item) to remove the review. I didn't take it but maybe others had. And I wonder if I was duped into buying the thing because previous negative reviewers had been bought off. Considering the fake reviews and the number of counterfeit items I've received from Amazon, I defa…

I'd be very tempted to remove the review, take the money, then repost the review...

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#58

Post by sutterbomb »

plink wrote: post #2

I feel unaffected by such fake reviews as the only ones I ascribe much value to are the negative ones. Also, I've extremely curtailed any purchasing on Amazon as I've come to perceive the majority of their marketplace to be a degenerative crap house.

I’m an amazon seller with our own brand of products, and many of our 1 star reviews are fakes by the competition. For awhile we also had a bunch of returns and Amazon temporarily closed our listing because of the poor performance. When I looked into it the addresses on those orders were to a variety of different motels in Alabama. People are shady af and it’s frustrating trying to do business legitimately.

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#59

Post by jonplackett »

gitgud wrote: post #8
dragontamer wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I met a family member (like 2nd cousin or further away) at some wedding a few years ago. I only talked to him once, but he was very clear about this situation. He owned a hotel, and was trying to track down the writers of bad reviews on Yelp. Primarily, as the owner of the hotel, it was his job to find out what's wrong about the hotel and improve it. But he started to investigate some of the 1-star reviews, and came…

So you can leave a review without even using the service or product on Yelp? Without a verified purchase, why would anyway take the review seriously?

not required on amazon either. you can just review anything.

Re: Fake review factories that run on Facebook and post five-star Amazon reviews

#60

Post by brilee »

BugsJustFindMe wrote: post #15
bingbingo wrote: post #4

Shit like this is what made me lose confidence in Amazon and I stopped my prime subscription. My wife bought me “luxury” branded jackets and clothing for fall. Half of them were counterfeit. I called Amazon and they said I can return them and they’ll send me new ones. Ok. How will I know those won’t be counterfeit? Worse, I found a jacket was counterfeit after the return period when it literally started to fall apart…

Technically, the pervasive Amazon counterfeit problem is unrelated to the fake review problem. Both are serious problems that Amazon does little to combat, but they're not the same. The counterfeiting is more insidious because Amazon is entirely at fault for mixing legit merchandise with counterfeits. Fake reviews on the other hand aren't Amazon's fault. That's just the world being filled with heinous assholes out to…

Amazon absolutely has to deal with the fake review problem. In some ways, you can think of it as analogous to google search. Google's moneymaker isn't the search; it's the ads. But Google spends a lot of time fixing search quality and dealing with people gaming search results because otherwise the ad revenue disappears.
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