Apr 11, 2023 13:00:00

A fine of 80 million yen will be imposed on retailers who performed Amazon's 'review hijacking' that sells completely different new products as variations of highly rated products

The U.S.

Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has issued a judgment including a $600,000 (about 80 million yen) fine to a retailer who sold another product as a variation of a highly rated product on Amazon. bottom. It is the first-ever FTC enforcement action on a ``review hijacking'' technique that boosts ratings by hijacking ratings received by other products.

FTC Approves Final Order against The Bountiful Company in First Case Alleging Hijacking of Online Product Reviews | Federal Trade Commission
https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2023/04/ftc-approves-final-order-against-bountiful-company-first-case-alleging-hijacking-online-product

FTC Charges Supplement Marketer with Hijacking Ratings and Reviews on Amazon.com and Using Them to Deceive Consumers | Federal Trade Commission
https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2023/02/ftc-charges-supplement-marketer-hijacking-ratings-reviews-amazoncom-using-them-deceive-consumers

(PDF file) In the Matter of THE BOUNTIFUL COMPANY, a corporation. | UNITED STATES OF AMERICA BEFORE THE FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION
https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/the_bountiful_company_complaint.pdf

FTC orders supplement maker to pay $600K in first case involving hijacked Amazon reviews | TechCrunch
https://techcrunch.com/2023/04/10/ftc-orders-supplement-maker-to-pay-600k-in-first-case-involving-hijacked-amazon-reviews/

FTC fines supplement maker $600,000 for 'review hijacking' Amazon listings | Engadget
https://www.engadget.com/ftc-fines-supplement-maker-600000-for-review-hijacking-amazon-listings-210142185.html

In 2020 and 2021, supplement retailer The Bountiful Company exploited Amazon's features to make it appear that some of its new supplements received higher ratings than actual reviews. It was announced on April 10, 2023 that the FTC had fined him $600,000.

According to the FTC, Bountiful used tactics to trick viewers about the 'variant selection feature' on Amazon product pages. Amazon's variation selection function is, for example, the following is the content on the product page of ' DHC multivitamin ', and the options similar to the product you are currently looking at are 'set with DHC chitosan' and 'set with DHC calcium/mag'. In addition to being able to choose , you can also choose the size of 60 grains, 120 grains, 180 grains, 1 bag or 2 bags each. It is mainly a function that allows you to select the size and color variations of fashion items, etc., and the amount of contents such as food items according to your preference.

According to the FTC complaint, the detail page for a product in a variant relationship displays the total ratings, reviews, and average star rating for all products in the variant. It has been pointed out that by exploiting this, Bountiful integrated the product page and manipulated the evaluation by applying to Amazon for new products as variations of products that have been stably evaluated in the past. The product selected as a variant had a different formulation or formulation purpose and was clearly inappropriate to be labeled as a variant, the FTC said. Also, the 'No.1 Best Seller' and 'Amazon's Choice' badges that the old product had got were shared with the new product by integrating the pages.

As of August 2020, the new product had 1000 reviews and a high rating of 4.5 stars, but before the page was merged, there were only 26 reviews and a rating of 3.2 stars, and Bountiful's ``Unfortunately, consumers didn't like the new product, but the moment we changed the page, sales skyrocketed and continued to grow,'' said an e-commerce rep. In its complaint, the FTC cites more than a dozen cases that took place between 2020 and 2021.

'Hijacking another product's ratings and reviews to promote your own product is a relatively new tactic,' said Samuel Levin, director of the FTC's Office of Consumer Protection. is prohibited,” he said.

An Amazon spokesperson told Engadget, ``There is no place in our store that encourages fraud. Our policy prohibits review abuse, such as gift card offerings in exchange for writing a positive review, and we will not punish anyone who violates these policies. We will suspend or ban accounts, take legal action, and remove inaccurate reviews.' According to Amazon, more than 99% of reviews are genuine reviews, and it will work with the FTC and other enforcement agencies to eliminate the remaining 1%.