I read this in a UK newspaper today. This is a good move; posting fake book reviews debases and devalues genuine reviews posted by honest readers of our works.

A campaign against “consumer catfishing” has been announced by the British Government as it unveiled plans to make it illegal to pay for bogus online reviews.

It will become an offence to pay someone to write or host a fake review under plans which could allow the Competition and Markets Authority to impose fines of up to 10 per cent of a company’s annual sales as a fine.

The regulator estimates suspicious reviews influence £23 billion of purchases in Britain per year.

US tech giants Amazon and Google are already facing a competition investigation over their failure to tackle false product reviews, which are often written to make goods seem more popular than they really are.

Businesses have always been able to sue for defamation over a bad review. In 2015, Amazon sued sellers of fake product reviews, saying they damaged its brand reputation.

More recently, the website has deleted rogue reviews following various investigations from authorities, consumer groups and the media.

Paul Scully, UK Consumer Minister, said big online retailers have a bigger role to play in cleaning up their marketplaces.

“We have to have a drive that these online companies are showing they’re responsible for consumers as well. So if there is more work for them to do, there is more work for them to do,” he said.

The rules will focus on the “black and white” issue of bought and sold fake reviews, he added. Other attempts to manipulate the reviews market, such as by asking for unfavourable ones to be deleted, will not be tackled.

Mr Scully promised the regulator would get the necessary funding to take on these powers, saying: “We’ll make sure that they’re adequately resourced in the spending review that’s coming up.”

Article credit: Howard Mustoe, UK Daily Telegraph