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FTC Brings First Case Challenging Fake Paid Reviews on an Indie Retail Website

ftc.gov

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Re: FTC Brings First Case Challenging Fake Paid Reviews on an Indie Retail Website

#21

Post by duxup »

potatofarmer45 wrote: post #6

There are so many fake reviews on Amazon that the "average" stars for a product are no longer reliable indicators of quality. Especially for cheap electronics (read: headphones), products that have only been listed for a month somehow have hundreds of 5 star glowing reviews. When I do research nowadays I have to deliberately select the 1 star reviews to see if there is a real issue that's glossed over by the paid rev…

Not sure how much the negative reviews are useful.

It's not uncommon to hear about folks targeting competitors with lower star reviews as just getting 5* reviews isn't enough to stand out.

Re: FTC Brings First Case Challenging Fake Paid Reviews on an Indie Retail Website

#22

Post by ceejayoz »

jawns wrote: post #9
ceejayoz wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why wouldn't it be enforceable? It's a court order. It's also quite standard: https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/blogs/business-blog/2016/03/...

My apologies. I should have said "recoverable" rather than "enforceable." I would assume that if a company is in trouble with the FTC, it's probably not in the best financial shape after paying even the costs associated with the suspended judgment. So if the FTC finds that the company made an omission and the full judgment comes due, will it actually recover that money? Or is the point to just fine them out of existe…

If the FTC discovers they've hidden assets, they can go back to court, reinstate the full penalty, and go after those assets. I suspect there'd be additional criminal charges like perjury available to them, as well.

Re: FTC Brings First Case Challenging Fake Paid Reviews on an Indie Retail Website

#23

Post by Judgmentality »

toufiqbarhamov wrote: post #17
organsnyder wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're abusing the "color" parameter to be multiple products instead. It's astounding that Amazon has yet to actively prohibit this.

Nothing about Amazon’s abuse of their customers surprises me anymore. Their “Amazon’s Recommemdation” is a joke too, and they’re associating their brand with garbage. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Gflpf0DrCgw Par for the Amazon course, cheap Chinese knockoffs. If they had anything other than a highly permissive refund system, they’d already be drowning in lawsuits. They must bleed refund money though, and I thought B…

> They must bleed refund money though, and I thought Bezos was all about right margins?

That's the part that worries me. Amazon surely knows this is a problem, and I'm sure they know much more about it than we do. And yet they allow it to continue. It genuinely makes me concerned for the future of their business, where they know actually providing a quality experience is going to hammer their revenue/profits.

Re: FTC Brings First Case Challenging Fake Paid Reviews on an Indie Retail Website

#24

Post by ashelmire »

potatofarmer45 wrote: post #6

There are so many fake reviews on Amazon that the "average" stars for a product are no longer reliable indicators of quality. Especially for cheap electronics (read: headphones), products that have only been listed for a month somehow have hundreds of 5 star glowing reviews. When I do research nowadays I have to deliberately select the 1 star reviews to see if there is a real issue that's glossed over by the paid rev…

Same.

A friend in the ecommerce industry tells of some pretty dark patterns - some companies won't allow negative reviews to be posted at all. Attempts to leave negative reviews trigger chat or other communication methods instead of posting the review.

Amazon also won't allow most negative reviews - I've had many 1 star reviews denied by their automated system, but this has never happened with a 5 star review.

Re: FTC Brings First Case Challenging Fake Paid Reviews on an Indie Retail Website

#25

Post by skywhopper »

duskwuff wrote: post #13
potatofarmer45 wrote: post #6

There are so many fake reviews on Amazon that the "average" stars for a product are no longer reliable indicators of quality. Especially for cheap electronics (read: headphones), products that have only been listed for a month somehow have hundreds of 5 star glowing reviews. When I do research nowadays I have to deliberately select the 1 star reviews to see if there is a real issue that's glossed over by the paid rev…

Or reviews that were transferred over from other products. Here's a case in point: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07MH9HPTR Over 3000 reviews... most of them for products completely unrelated to the one on sale. I see reviews for a bicycle lamp, a phone screen protector, and a voltage converter. This seems like a bug. Surely Amazon shouldn't allow sellers to transfer product reviews over from other products?

I just ran into this last night searching for a converter dongle, and got hundreds of reviews for silicone rings, which... what?

Re: FTC Brings First Case Challenging Fake Paid Reviews on an Indie Retail Website

#26

Post by samat »

mc32 wrote: post #18

Crowdsourced reviews are problematic (often but not always lacking context). Paid reviews make them worthless. Perhaps this is one use of a blockchain which could add credibility to reviews. Still by and large I prefer independent professional reviews (combined with authentic crowdsourced reviews), the problem with these, like CR, is that they’re not scalable to thousands of new products periodically, so we have to r…

How on earth would blockchain help?

Re: FTC Brings First Case Challenging Fake Paid Reviews on an Indie Retail Website

#27

Post by macintux »

toufiqbarhamov wrote: post #17
organsnyder wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're abusing the "color" parameter to be multiple products instead. It's astounding that Amazon has yet to actively prohibit this.

Nothing about Amazon’s abuse of their customers surprises me anymore. Their “Amazon’s Recommemdation” is a joke too, and they’re associating their brand with garbage. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Gflpf0DrCgw Par for the Amazon course, cheap Chinese knockoffs. If they had anything other than a highly permissive refund system, they’d already be drowning in lawsuits. They must bleed refund money though, and I thought B…

What percentage of customers go through the refund process? I think I refund maybe one purchase every 4-5 years, for all of my retail activity combined. I don't believe I've ever bothered with Amazon.

Re: FTC Brings First Case Challenging Fake Paid Reviews on an Indie Retail Website

#28

Post by riazrizvi »

gav wrote: post #4

I still don't understand why Amazon has done so little to combat the plague of fake reviews. It seems like it's something that's going to blow up eventually and bite them. Along those lines: why do they still value reviews that aren't associated with a purchase? This is the logical first step.

Because 1) having any reviews at all drives purchases because of a social proof effect (see Influence - Cialdini). 2) Amazon are not liable because of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act (platform operators shall not be treated like the content publishers who create information on those platform).

Re: FTC Brings First Case Challenging Fake Paid Reviews on an Indie Retail Website

#29

Post by hombre_fatal »

president wrote: post #11
potatofarmer45 wrote: post #6

There are so many fake reviews on Amazon that the "average" stars for a product are no longer reliable indicators of quality. Especially for cheap electronics (read: headphones), products that have only been listed for a month somehow have hundreds of 5 star glowing reviews. When I do research nowadays I have to deliberately select the 1 star reviews to see if there is a real issue that's glossed over by the paid rev…

Even the 1 star negative reviews are faked. Sellers pay users to leave negative reviews to competitors. EDIT: Funny how completely broken and anti-customer the Amazon review system is given that the #1 leadership principle at Amazon [1] is the following: "Customer Obsession - Leaders start with the customer and work backwards. They work vigorously to earn and keep customer trust. Although leaders pay attention to com…

If I were inflating my rating with 5-star reviews, I'd also want some 1-star reviews to complain about inconsequential things like "the coffee machine's cord was only 5 meters long" or "it was a bit louder than I expected, waking me up more than I wanted during my morning routine."

Re: FTC Brings First Case Challenging Fake Paid Reviews on an Indie Retail Website

#30

Post by elektor »

Last year I bought a set of cheap Bluetooth headphones on Amazon which I use on a daily basis. It's obvious they have an affiliate program because I often seem on those daily deal roundup posts that a lot of tech blogs now have.

Recently, I've been getting emails from the vendors asking me to leave a review in return for a free product. Here is a copy and paste of one:

Dear Customer,

Thank you for purchasing our (HEADPHONES). Are you satisfied with the Bluetooth headphones that you bought? If there is any question or concern regarding product quality, please don't hesitate to contact us first.

If your (BRAND) experience has been everything you hoped it would be, share it with the world! Meanwhile, to express our sincere thanks for your kind support, we are more than happy to send you a (FREE PRODUCT) for free if you are willing to leave us a review since this would be very helpful for other customers who are also interested in this product.

If you are interested in a (FREE PRODUCT), please get back to us with the screenshot of your review.

Note: you can click the link below directly to leave your positive review: (LINK TO AMAZON TO LEAVE REVIEW)

Please rest assured that we’ll arrange (FREE PRODUCT) to you ASAP after we receive the screenshot of your review together with your shipping address.

Any questions, please kindly let us know.

Have a nice day!

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