Amazon AMZN 3.86% is suing the administrators of more than 10,000 Facebook groups who allegedly coordinated fake reviews on the shopping giant’s platform. While Amazon didn’t name the administrators, the company identified a group called “Amazon Product Review,” which it said had more than 43,000 members.
Wherever ratings exist – for apps, restaurants, products – there is also manipulation. Amazon, as the country’s largest online retailer, is the most likely place you’ll find it. The majority of its products come from its Marketplace program, where millions of third-party sellers compete to sell everything from USB cables to patio furniture. Fake reviews can help sellers get an edge and make more money, hence those cheap “five star” no name products that you buy and then wish you hadn’t.
It’s against Amazon’s rules for third parties to pay or encourage people with free products or cash compensation. However, many do so and evade detection by coordinating on platforms like Facebook. A spokeswoman for Meta, Facebook’s parent company, said: “Groups that solicit or encourage fake reviews are violating our policies and will be removed. We are working with Amazon on this matter and will continue to work together across the industry to address fake reviews.”
Amazon’s legal action is a step towards reducing fake reviews on its platform. “Proactive legal action against bad actors is one of many ways we protect customers by holding bad actors accountable,” said Dharmesh Mehta, an Amazon vice president who oversees customer trust, in a press release.
But it’s a never-ending battle for Amazon, and one that probably won’t just go away.
I’ve written about how some sellers prey on customers who leave negative reviews, and how others include promotional inserts for gift cards or free products in exchange for reviews. A study by researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles, published July 11, shows that products with fake reviews share a common group of reviewers. This pool could easily move to another communication channel.
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“We want Amazon customers to shop with confidence, knowing that the reviews they see are authentic and trustworthy. That’s why we take review abuse seriously and want to prevent fake reviews from ever appearing on our store,” an Amazon spokeswoman said in a statement after this column was published. She said the company receives more than 30 million reviews weekly and that more than 12,000 Amazon employees work to prevent fraud and abuse, including fake reviews. “We stopped hundreds of millions of suspected fake reviews before they were seen by a customer,” she added.
You still need to research in the review section when shopping online. I check some products like electronics or skincare more thoroughly, as inferior quality or mislabelling can have bigger consequences. You can’t tell with 100% certainty if reviews have been tampered with – even “verified purchases” reviews can be fake – but there are some telltale signs of the most obvious culprits.
How to recognize manipulated reviews
If you’re on an Amazon listing, look for a small link with the number of reviews just below the product title. This link is a shortcut to the bottom of the page showing a summary of customer reviews.
Scroll to the bottom of this section and click View All Reviews. This will take you to a dashboard where you can sort reviews by positive or critical, search the review text, or filter by verified purchases.
• Avoid products with only five star ratings. Any product with hundreds or thousands of reviews should have a healthy mix of star ratings.
• Look at the one star reviews first. Watch out for repeated mentions of glaring flaws. Select “1 Star Only” from the “All Stars” drop-down menu in the Ratings Dashboard. If the negative feedback relates to something beyond the seller’s control, such as B. a late delivery by the shipping partner, I give a pass.
• Sort by most recent. Under Sort by, change the dropdown menu from Top Reviews to Newest. This often provides a better mix of reviews and can reveal current shipping or quality control issues.
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• Actually read the reviews. This is obvious: do the reviewers mention that they haven’t actually tried the product yet? I once came across a case for a new device that wasn’t on the market yet, with dozens of positive reviews! Also check the dates. If many of the comments were posted around the same time, this could be an indication of manipulation.
• Be suspicious of positive photo and video reviews. Images can be helpful in understanding a product’s size or features, but paid review processes often require reviewers to involve media. Because of this, a simple bathmat can end up with minute-long video reviews exaggerating its plushness or color.
• Look for warning signs like “gift” or “free”. In the search box (“Find Customer Reviews”), look for reviews that mention a gift certificate or free product in exchange, which might indicate that the seller is improving ratings through financial incentives.
• Search for merged ratings. Scan the text for reviews of completely different products. You can also see if there are other versions of the entry. Click the All Formats dropdown menu to view other variations of the product. Some sellers will merge two different listings to increase the number of reviews. If you see a book review on a page for a garden hose, stay away.
• View global reviews. Now that Amazon is adding international reviews to its US product listings, some sellers are merging reviews of different products from other countries to inflate ratings. On the product’s main listing page, scroll down to “Top reviews from other countries” to see international reviews.
• Visit the seller page. Under the big orange Buy Now button, look at the seller’s name next to “Sold by.” If the product is not sold directly by Amazon, the text is a link to the seller’s storefront. Here you’ll see seller-specific feedback, the seller’s location, and the most important information of all – the seller’s refund policy. You should know if Amazon’s 30-day return policy or some other seller-specific policy applies in case something goes wrong.
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