How Amazon sellers are allegedly drumming up fake reviews, according to a leaked database
Late last week, the security research group Safety Detectives reported that it had found a database that contained records of conversations between Amazon sellers and their customers. Included in that data, according to Safety Detectives, are exchanges that show how Amazon sellers arranged for customers to leave positive reviews of their products. If a customer left a five-star rating, the sellers offered to refund them in full for their purchase. In most cases, they offered the reimbursements through PayPal, not Amazon, so that Amazon moderators wouldn’t be able to pick up on the collusion. Safety Detectives said it found evidence of at least 200,000 reviews that are the result of a refund scheme.
In a response to a request for comment, Amazon said that “we have long-standing policies to protect the integrity of our store, including product authenticity, genuine reviews, and products meeting the expectations of our customers.” But the report is thrusting the question of fake reviews on Amazon — an issue that Amazon has wrestled with over the past several years — back into the spotlight.
“This is something we’ve known about for many years,” Saoud Khalifah, CEO of the fake review analytics firm Fakespot, told Modern Retail. Plenty of groups across Facebook, WhatsApp and Telegram, along with public Twitter hashtags, are openly devoted to these types of paid review schemes. What is rare, he said, is to see the details in action — for instance, Safety Detectives outlined how sellers would give their reviewers advice on how to make the reviews seem authentic, such as by requesting that the review contain “30+ words.”
