New Delhi: In a major step towards protecting the interests of online buyers of e-Commerce platforms such as Amazon, Flipkart, Snapdeal, Tata Group and Reliance Retail among others, the Department of Consumer Affairs will review the problem of fake reviews so that online buyers can get correct and truthful information about the products sold online.
The Department of Consumer Affairs has already communicated to all the stakeholders such as Consumer Forums, Law Universities, Lawyers, FICCI, CII and Consumer Rights Activists, including online platforms, to discuss the issue so that the magnitude of the problem of fake product reviews in the country can be assessed.
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It is important as online buyers do not have the opportunity to physically review the products and they rely heavily on the reviews of the product posted by other buyers. In a statement, the Department of Consumer Affairs said that the ‘fake product reviewers’ is on its radar as more and more people are buying products and services online with the growing internet and smartphone usage.
Fake product reviews violate consumers' rights
In a letter to the stakeholders, Rohit Singh, secretary in the Department of Consumer Affairs, said e-Commerce involves a virtual shopping experience without any opportunity to physically view or examine the product and consumers heavily rely on reviews posted on e-Commerce platforms to see the opinion and experience of users, who have already purchased the goods or service. “As a result, due to fake and misleading reviews, the right to be informed, which is a consumer right under the Consumer Protection Act, 2019 is violated,” Singh said.
Rampant problem of fake product reviews
In his letter to the stakeholders, Singh also shared the findings of the European Commission, which conducted the screening of online consumer reviews across 223 major websites operating in the European Union. The screening conducted by the European Commission showed that more than half of the websites violate the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive of the European Union, which requires truthful information to be presented to consumers to make an informed choice.
The European Commission’s finding also showed that in the case of nearly two-thirds of the total 223 websites selling products online, the authorities were not able to confirm that the sellers on these platforms were doing enough to ensure that the product reviews were authentic. It means that the product reviews were indeed posted by those consumers, who had purchased and used the products and services that they were reviewing on those sites.
Sellers push bogus reviews to drive online sale
This suspicion is always there that the sellers and companies use bogus product reviewers to gain good ratings for their products and services to drive their sales on these online platforms. The top officer in the Department of Consumer Affairs said since the issue impacts people shopping online daily and has a significant impact on their rights as a consumer, it is important that it is examined with greater scrutiny and detail. In association with the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI), the Department of Consumer Affairs is organising a virtual meeting on Friday to discuss the impact of fake and misleading reviews on consumers and possible measures to prevent such anomalies.
