Aug 11, 2021 07:00:00

It turns out that the Amazon seller was requesting to cancel the low rating in exchange for money, and the email address was also illegally obtained

In Amazon, fraudulent acts that receive money and post highly rated reviews for products are rampant, and in June 2021, the products of home appliance makers who were allegedly cheating were deleted from Amazon all at once. Has occurred . The Wall Street Journal reports that there is a new fraudulent act of 'requesting the withdrawal of low-rated reviews in exchange for money' over such Amazon fraudulent reviews.

When Amazon Customers Leave Negative Reviews, Some Sellers Hunt Them Down --WSJ
https://www.wsj.com/articles/when-amazon-customers-leave-negative-reviews-some-sellers-hunt-them-down-11628420400

This time, it was Catherine Scott, who lives in New York, USA, who reported the existence of cheating. In March 2021, Scott ordered an oil spray of $ 10, which had an average of 4.5 points and a total of nearly 1000 ratings, from Amazon. However, the oil spray that arrived to Mr. Scott did not have the function as advertised, and it was a product that caused terrible dripping. Scott posted a negative review of this oil spray.

A week after posting a low-rated review, Scott said from the customer support team of the oil spray distributor, 'We are ready to give you a full refund.' 'You could consider deleting the review at your convenience. I'm happy if I received an email saying 'I'm happy.' Scott didn't intend to delete the review, so he only requested a refund, but the refund was rejected.

The next day, the customer support team said, 'Negative reviews of products are a fatal blow to us.' 'Can you help me remove the reviews? If possible, thank you. I'd like to refund $ 20 to convey my feelings, 'he sent me an email asking me to remove a negative review instead of paying twice the price of the item.

Amazon does not disclose your email address to sellers who use the Amazon Marketplace. Nevertheless, Scott, who received an email directly from the oil spray distributor, reported the above exchange to Amazon and asked for action. However, Amazon only contacted me to 'investigate the case' and was not informed of the results of the investigation.

When the Wall Street Journal asked Amazon to comment on Scott's case, Amazon said, 'The problem was detected by an internal process and we took appropriate action,' Scott bought. I deleted the page of the oil spray and the page of the seller. However, even at the time of writing the article, if you search for 'oil spray' on Amazon.com , products with the same design as the one purchased by Mr. Scott will be displayed in a row.

When I checked the review section of the oil spray that has received more than 4000 ratings among these oil sprays, 'This product is useless' 'Posting a highly rated review can earn money Along with reviews such as 'There is a mechanism that can be done', 'When I posted a negative review, I received a contact requesting deletion of the review in exchange for $ 30 (about 3300 yen)' in the same situation as Mr. Scott. A review of the person I encountered was also posted.

According to Scott, the oil spray he purchased included a card stating, 'If you enter your email address and your order ID on Amazon, you will receive a free gift.' The Wall Street Journal speculates that the seller used a free gift campaign to collect user email addresses.

The Wall Street Journal points out that asking users to withdraw reviews in exchange for money and collecting email addresses violates Amazon's terms. To reduce similar damage, The Wall Street Journal takes measures such as 'save all message exchanges,' 'report to Amazon with as many screenshots as possible,' and 'designate seller emails as junk emails.' Is recommended.