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FTC's rule banning fake online reviews goes into effect

(abcnews.go.com)
376 points indus | 4 comments | 22 Oct 24 15:21 UTC | HN request time: 0.199s | source
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bragr ◴[22 Oct 24 15:27 UTC] No.41915238[source]▶
Does the regulation say anything about deceptively moderating reviews? e.g. deleting all the low star reviews?

edit: it doesn't seem so. You just have use some weasel language:

>The final rule also bars a business from misrepresenting that the reviews on a review portion of its website represent all or most of the reviews submitted when reviews have been suppressed based upon their ratings or negative sentiment.

https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2024/08/...

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onlyrealcuzzo ◴[22 Oct 24 15:48 UTC] No.41915513[source]▶
How does this stop one of the most common practices?

* Step 1, take a product with a terrible rating

* Step 2, create a new SKU for the exact same product so it has no ratings

* Step 3, get a handful of fake 5-star reviews (in some way the FTC isn't going to crack down on)

* Step 4, blast the old terribly reviewed product that now has good reviews on marketing

* Step 5, get 10s of thousands of sales, $$$

* Step 6, let the terrible reviews pour in

Repeat to step 1 (possibly under a different brand name).

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1. bilekas ◴[22 Oct 24 16:04 UTC] No.41915693[source]▶
Something similar to this happens on eBay. Sellers will sell a product say a usb adapter, cheap and fully functional, users leave reviews and then the seller changes the listing to be a completely different item, retaining all the previous ratings and sale counts. How would this apply here is a good question.

Wouldn't like to assume but regulatory bodies usually think about these things in advance no ?

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2. thereddaikon ◴[22 Oct 24 16:23 UTC] No.41915906[source]▶
Haven't ebay reviews always meant to be about the seller and not necessarily the product? Ebay started with the expectation it was normal people auctioning used goods. Having reviews for a specific product doesn't make sense when there is no fixed product. Obviously things have changed over the years but the site is still largely built around those assumptions.
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3. bilekas ◴[22 Oct 24 16:26 UTC] No.41915938[source]▶
Yeah so when you view a listing now from a business it will show "100 units sold" but you're right it's crazy you can just change the whole product. I think it's specific for the business sellers.
4. bcrosby95 ◴[22 Oct 24 21:15 UTC] No.41918791[source]▶
https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2023/06/...

They proposed including review hijacking. There's probably a reason why they didn't include it. Or maybe they think the rules they included already cover it.