Amazon sues two companies that allegedly help fill the site with fake reviews
Amazon on Tuesday filed a lawsuit against two companies that allegedly acted as “fake review brokers.”
The lawsuits filed in King County Superior Court in Seattle accuse the companies, AppSally and Rebatest, of fostering fake reviews on Amazon's online marketplace. The companies allegedly connected third-party sellers with consumers who would leave a positive review of their product, in exchange for free products or payments.
The case represents Amazon's latest effort to root out fake reviews on its sprawling third-party marketplace. The marketplace now accounts for more than half of Amazon's e-commerce sales and has helped the company bring in record revenue. But fake reviews have proven to be a particularly thorny issue for Amazon as the marketplace has grown to include millions of third-party merchants.
By filing the complaints, Amazon said it's aiming “to shut down two major fake review brokers,” that it claims “helped mislead shoppers by having their members try to post fake reviews in stores” like Amazon, eBay, Walmart and Etsy. AppSally and Rebatest say they have more than 900,000 users “willing to write fake reviews,” Amazon said.
Rebatest declined to comment. Representatives from AppSally didn't respond to a request for comment.
AppSally and Rebatest have been in operation since 2018, according to court filings. The complaint alleges AppSally orchestrated a scheme wherein sellers would pay the company a fee, in some cases as little as $25, to receive “verified reviews.”
After providing AppSally with a link to their product, the sellers would ship out empty boxes and provide AppSally with photos to be included with a user's review. Sellers would allegedly pay for the service with the hope that it boosted their product in Amazon search results. AppSally's website allegedly promised sellers they'd be able to “outrank your competitors from your bedroom,” according to the complaint.
Similarly, Rebatest offered sellers a cache of reviews and other services to manipulate their product rankings, the suit alleges. Users would place an order for a product on Amazon and leave a review. Rebatest allegedly refunded a users' purchase through services like PayPal.
Amazon seeks unspecified damages in both complaints, as well as an injunction from the companies that would bar them from selling or facilitating the sale of Amazon reviews.
Amazon is taking many steps to try and cut down on fake reviews and other fraud, including investments in machine learning tools and human moderators. It's also asked other social media companies to step in and assist, as fake review communities have cropped up in Facebook groups and in messaging apps like Telegram, WhatsApp and WeChat.
亚马逊周二对两家据称充当“虚假评论经纪人”的公司提起诉讼。 在西雅图金县高等法院提起的诉讼指控这两家公司 AppSally 和 Rebatest 在亚马逊的在线市场上助长了虚假评论。据称，这些公司将第三方卖家与会对他们的产品留下正面评价的消费者联系起来，以换取免费产品或付款。
此案代表了亚马逊在其庞大的第三方市场上根除虚假评论的最新努力。该市场现在占亚马逊电子商务销售额的一半以上，并帮助该公司创造了创纪录的收入。但事实证明，虚假评论对亚马逊来说是一个特别棘手的问题，因为市场已经发展到包括数百万第三方商家。
通过提交投诉，亚马逊表示其目标是“关闭两家主要的虚假评论经纪人”，并声称“通过让其成员试图在亚马逊、eBay、沃尔玛和 Etsy 等商店发布虚假评论来帮助误导购物者”。亚马逊表示，AppSally 和 Rebatest 表示，他们有超过 900,000 名用户“愿意撰写虚假评论”。
回扣拒绝置评。 AppSally 的代表没有回应置评请求。
根据法庭文件，AppSally 和 Rebatest 自 2018 年以来一直在运营。投诉称，AppSally 策划了一项计划，其中卖家将向公司支付费用，在某些情况下只需 25 美元，以获得“经过验证的评论”。
在向 AppSally 提供他们产品的链接后，卖家会运送空盒子并向 AppSally 提供照片以包含在用户评论中。据称，卖家会为这项服务付费，希望它能在亚马逊搜索结果中提升他们的产品。投诉称，AppSally 的网站据称向卖家承诺，他们将能够“在卧室里超越竞争对手”。
诉讼称，类似地，Rebatest 向卖家提供了大量评论和其他服务，以操纵他们的产品排名。用户会在亚马逊上订购产品并留下评论。据称，Rebatetest 通过 PayPal 等服务退还了用户的购买费用。
亚马逊在这两起投诉中都寻求未指明的损害赔偿，并要求这些公司发出禁令，禁止他们销售或促进销售亚马逊评论。
亚马逊正在采取许多措施来尝试减少虚假评论和其他欺诈行为，包括对机器学习工具和人工审核的投资。它还要求其他社交媒体公司介入并提供帮助，因为虚假评论社区已经出现在 Facebook 群组和 Telegram、WhatsApp 和微信等消息应用程序中。
