Amazon has filed a lawsuit against the leaders of more than 10,000 Facebook groups accusing it of publishing fake reviews on the e-commerce site, the company announced Tuesday.
The groups work around the world to recruit people who write fake reviews in exchange for money or free products, Amazon said in a press release. One of the groups in the lawsuit, which was removed by Facebook’s parent company Meta, had more than 43,000 members, the company said. The “incited and misleading” reviews targeted Amazon sites in the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Japan.
Amazon, which described itself in the lawsuit as a “pioneer of product reviews,” has been dealing with fake reviews for years. While the company has strict rules around fake reviews, it has pressured the Federal Trade Commission to take action, Vox reported. Last year, the British Competition and Markets Authority launched an investigation into how Amazon and Alphabet, the parent company of Google, deal with mock reviews.
The company said it had more than 12,000 employees working to fight fraudulent reviews, including those from groups coordinating their efforts on platforms such as Facebook and Twitter. Amazon said it had reported more than 10,000 fake reviews to Meta.
“The nefarious trade in fake reviews remains an industry-wide problem, and civil lawsuits are just one step,” the press release said.
