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| Fake reviews fill Amazon and it's hard to spot |
Thousands of fake reviews flooded the Amazon e-commerce platform and sales rose dramatically.
Since Amazon was founded, reviews have been the only important metric that customers use to determine product quality and originality.
Amazon listings usually contain hundreds or thousands of reviews rather than a handful of reviews in a competitive marketplace, but many of them are untrustworthy.
The methods range from Facebook groups requesting positively paying reviews to web robots that take negative reviews to outrun the competition, making it difficult to spot false reviews.
In July, the University of California and Los Angeles (UCLA) and the University of California (USC) published a study that found more than 20 groups linked to fake Facebook comments, with an average of 16,000 members.
At 560+ posts per day, sellers offer refunds or positive reviews, usually around $ 6
As shoppers stay at home and increasingly turn to the internet to find things they would normally like to purchase in person, the effects get worse.
In the past few months, fake reviews have increased sales of unsafe products and hurt the legitimate business of sellers, forcing many brands to split from Amazon.
Amazon uses powerful machine learning tools and seasoned investigators to analyze more than 10 million comments per week with the goal of stopping fake comments before they're published.
However, the trillion-dollar company recently deleted 20,000 comments from 7 of the UK's top 10 commentators after an investigation by the Financial Times.
The survey found that top Amazon reviewers in the UK are involved in fraudulent activity and that users have benefited from posting thousands of five-star reviews.
Among those whose reviews were canceled, Justin Fryer was the first to review Amazon.de, ranking a product worth £ 15,000 in August alone.
These are products from unknown Chinese brands who often offer to send products out to reviewers for free to get positive reviews.
He gave Fryer a five-star rating every four hours, then sold various items on eBay, and has grossed nearly £ 20,000 since June.