Which? response to Amazon calling for action on fake reviews

Rocio Concha, Which? Director of Policy and Advocacy, said:

"Which? has uncovered that Facebook fake review factories trading reviews for Amazon and other sites can still be found easily. Recent government research found that up to one in seven reviews in popular product categories on e-commerce platforms are fake – and our own research has shown how fake reviews make consumers more than twice as likely to choose poor-quality products – so fake and misleading reviews are still a huge problem.

"A better collaborative effort by industry and the government to share data to tackle the problem would be a step in the right direction. However, as Amazon suggests, there needs to be more clarity on enforcement. The government's Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Bill will be an important first step to enabling the regulator to clamp down on fake reviews, but the Bill must go further by explicitly making the buying, selling and hosting of fake reviews subject to criminal enforcement."