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FTC Puts Hundreds of Businesses on Notice about Fake Reviews

ftc.gov

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Re: FTC Puts Hundreds of Businesses on Notice about Fake Reviews

#41

Post by tw04 »

lazide wrote: post #27
ghaff wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reviews were more "expert"-based 20 years or so again in magazines that had some editorial oversight and processes for selecting and reviewing products. Of course, there were far fewer reviews available, companies still gamed reviewers/magazines but in different ways, and there was sometimes outright fraud around benchmarks, etc.

A huge portion of those reviews were payola, plain and simple. If a reviewer didn’t provide at least a somewhat positive review (even for complete dreck), they were often blacklisted.

Blacklisted how? 20 years ago consumer reports was considered a trusted source and they purchased everything they reviewed. How are you going to blacklist someone from going to the store and buying your product?

Re: FTC Puts Hundreds of Businesses on Notice about Fake Reviews

#42

Post by topkai22 »

DaveExeter wrote: post #22
Waterluvian wrote: post #7

Random thought: before the Internet were reviews any better? I know there were/are quality reviews like Consumer Reports and such. But were there any crowdsourced reviews? Are we worse off or are we just needing to protect people from their inability to scrutinize a new source of bad data?

>Random thought: before the Internet were reviews any better? Before the internet, there were these things called "magazines". These magazines earned money by selling ads. Advertisers sold products that were reviewed in the magazines they advertised in. And if a magazine's review was unfavorable to an advertisers product, that advertiser could reduce their ad spending. Also, advertisers could "bribe" reviewers. Proba…

Yeah, but there was/is more balance when the magazine had to keep its overall readership up and quite possibly had a manufacturer’s competitive advertising as well. Advertisers could influence reviews, especially to keep from getting a super low review, but I don’t recall stupendous reviews for absolute rubbish.

Re: FTC Puts Hundreds of Businesses on Notice about Fake Reviews

#43

Post by PaulDavisThe1st »

zz865 wrote: post #36
Waterluvian wrote: post #7

Random thought: before the Internet were reviews any better? I know there were/are quality reviews like Consumer Reports and such. But were there any crowdsourced reviews? Are we worse off or are we just needing to protect people from their inability to scrutinize a new source of bad data?

I think the point is you didn't rely on reviews. Before the internet you went to the shop and you could actually touch the product, try on clothes, use sporting goods, see how this laptop feels and how fast it works. Now buying online you have to trust reviews to choose what to buy.

I think this is bit simplistic. Before the internet, if you were going to buy something that was supposed to have objectively measurable properties, there would likely be a magazine/zine/journal that would include reviews by domain experts. Shovel? Laptop? Scalpel? Engine oil? Covered, you just bought the magazine.

The problem now is that the magazines are generally not as good at covering all the options, many of them have vanished, or have become online only equivalents.

Also, this is in part what the Whole Earth Catalog (later CoEvolution Quarterly and even later Whole Earth Review) was all about, and that's why more than a few people see it as a precursor to the web.

Re: FTC Puts Hundreds of Businesses on Notice about Fake Reviews

#44

Post by TedDoesntTalk »

mkhpalm wrote: post #32
ekianjo wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you know reviews were more reliable before ? In pretty much all industries people were hacking reviews before especially when channels were more limited. Nobody invented fraud yesterday.

One example I can remember from 10+ years ago was newegg. I don't recall ever really feeling like I got "duped" based on the many online reviews there. I think that sentiment was pretty well revered and not just my personal opinions of it. Everything was pretty well spot on from my experiences. That said, I have no idea how that would fair these days. I'll even go so far as to say back when Amazon was getting started…

Ebay seller reviews have been fraudulent for 20 years or more (not ALL reviews, of course).

And i think you are talking about the times before NewEgg had 3rd party sellers.

Re: FTC Puts Hundreds of Businesses on Notice about Fake Reviews

#45

Post by hodgesrm »

mkhpalm wrote: post #32
ekianjo wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you know reviews were more reliable before ? In pretty much all industries people were hacking reviews before especially when channels were more limited. Nobody invented fraud yesterday.

One example I can remember from 10+ years ago was newegg. I don't recall ever really feeling like I got "duped" based on the many online reviews there. I think that sentiment was pretty well revered and not just my personal opinions of it. Everything was pretty well spot on from my experiences. That said, I have no idea how that would fair these days. I'll even go so far as to say back when Amazon was getting started…

Newegg reviews were pretty good--they steered me away from a lot of noisy gear when building servers. That kind of feedback does not exist in the specs.

Re: FTC Puts Hundreds of Businesses on Notice about Fake Reviews

#46

Post by PaulDavisThe1st »

DaveExeter wrote: post #22
Waterluvian wrote: post #7

Random thought: before the Internet were reviews any better? I know there were/are quality reviews like Consumer Reports and such. But were there any crowdsourced reviews? Are we worse off or are we just needing to protect people from their inability to scrutinize a new source of bad data?

>Random thought: before the Internet were reviews any better? Before the internet, there were these things called "magazines". These magazines earned money by selling ads. Advertisers sold products that were reviewed in the magazines they advertised in. And if a magazine's review was unfavorable to an advertisers product, that advertiser could reduce their ad spending. Also, advertisers could "bribe" reviewers. Proba…

In many fields, though, there were the magazines that everbody knew were bought and sold by advertisers, and those that weren't. In my domain, Sound on Sound (about pro-audio and music creation tech) is in the latter category, and has been for decades. Even the advertisers know it, and seem willing to deal with the periodic "actually, the new Foo from Bar is mostly a piece of junk that you will not want to buy" because it makes the "wow, the new Baz from Bomb is totally awesome and you will use it everyday".

Re: FTC Puts Hundreds of Businesses on Notice about Fake Reviews

#48

Post by bagacrap »

dmalik wrote: post #33

> “Advertisers will pay a price if they engage in these deceptive practices.” > These include, but are not limited to: falsely claiming an endorsement by a third party; misrepresenting whether an endorser is an actual, current, or recent user; using an endorsement to make deceptive performance claims; failing to disclose an unexpected material connection with an endorser; and misrepresenting that the experience of en…

The business could run afoul of any of these guidelines if they plant the review on Amazon.

Re: FTC Puts Hundreds of Businesses on Notice about Fake Reviews

#49

Post by gnabgib »

sour-taste wrote: post #5
yellow_lead wrote: post #2

I wonder if they have any intention of going after Amazon - probably not.

Amazon is listed as one of the companies receiving the notice, though as the list says that's not evidence that they've done anything wrong. Google, Pepsi, and others who are unlikely to be involved in this are there too https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/attachments/penalty-offense...

This list is.. extensive, including tech darlings (Airbnb, Beats[Apple], Epic Games, Facebook, Lyft, Netflix, PayPal, Razer, Uber, WhatsApp(FB), YouTube(google)) too "big to fail" (3M, Apple, Berkshire Hathaway, Dell, Google, HP, Ikea, LG, LVHM, Microsoft, Walmart, Walt Disney), fast food (Applebee's, Arby's, Burger King, Dairy Queen, Domino's, Ferrero, Hershey, Kashi, Kellogg McDonald's, Kraft Heinz, Olive Garden, Pizza the hutt, Wendy's), covid vaccines (AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson, Pfizer). But also duplicates (AutoZone Parts/AutoZone Stores/AutoZone/Autozone.com, Best Buy Co/BestBuy.com, Big Lots Online/Big Lots Inc, Activision Blizzard/Activision Publihsing/Blizzard Entertainment, Cargill Meat Solutions/Cargill, many others). Shout out to Moderna for not making the list, and Gap Inc (Banana Republic, Old Navy) for getting all brands in.

Re: FTC Puts Hundreds of Businesses on Notice about Fake Reviews

#50

Post by cortesoft »

Notanothertoo wrote: post #15
cortesoft wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People either got their reviews from quality, trusted third parties like Consumer Reports, or they got reviews from friends. It would be pretty expensive to bribe consumer reports, and it isn't as cost effective to pay someone to give fake recommendations to their friends as it is to pay for fake recommendations on a website. Although some companies do that; it is called multi level marketing.

Consumer reports kind of went down hill too. It was the solution though, I remember people paid good money for sun service.

It was hard to compete with free online reviews.
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