Slashdot Mirror
Brooklyn Yogurt Shop Sting Snares Fake Reviewers For NY Attorney General
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "Reuters reports that nineteen companies caught writing fake reviews on websites such as Yelp, Google Local and CitySearch have been snared in a year-long sting operation by the New York Attorney General and will pay $350,000 in penalties. The Attorney General's office set up a fake yogurt shop in Brooklyn, New York, and sought help from firms that specialize in boosting online search results to combat negative reviews. Search optimization companies offered to post fake reviews of the yogurt shop, created online profiles, and paid as little as $1 per review to freelance writers in the Philippines, Bangladesh and Eastern Europe. To avoid detection the companies used 'advanced IP spoofing techniques' to hide their true identities. 'This investigation into large-scale, intentional deceit across the Internet tells us that we should approach online reviews with caution,' said Attorney General Eric Schneiderman. 'More than 100 million visitors come to Yelp each month, making it critical that Yelp protect the integrity of its content,' said Aaron Schur, Yelp's Senior Litigation Counsel."
I clap my hands. Only question is - how did they found out who was paying for crimes?
that's huge money for such little work. especially in countries like bangladesh.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
"Yogurt! Yogurt! I hate Yogurt! Even with strawberries."
I am officially gone from
What has the world come to?!
it seems to me, if yelp is interested in preserving it's value to customers, part of that would be preventing fake reviews. why would we get our legal system involved? not to mention - when did it become illegal to lie on the internet...or conversly - when did the internet become even close to being legitimate enough that you need the legal system to protect it's truthfulness?
I've never used their services. Are they somehow relevant somewhere?
Finally had enough. Come see us over at https://soylentnews.org/
350K is the cost of business. No way does this stop without someone going to jail or a fine large enough to offset the profit generated by such shennanigans.
Internet comments are not to be trusted. *
* I was paid to post this comment.
I'm unclear: was this fake Yogurt shop actually listed on Yelp? Or did he just pose as a Yogurt shop owner and seek the help of SEO firms?
If the former, one might imagine a hapless Brooklynite trying to find this awesome place they read about on Yelp and being sorely disappointed when the address ended up being, what? A PO box? And then wouldn't they then go onto Yelp and report the address as wrong?
and only trust those that have details about what was wrong
anyone who has been online for a few years should have developed the skills to quickly scan hundreds of comments and filter out the trolls and shills
Where are the feds with this one? IP spoofing was one of the charges the feds used to intimidate Aaron Swartz.
This sounds suspiciously like a Seinfeld episode.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
This kind of thing has been going on for as long as there have been online comments about products. One of the first sites I ran was an infomercial product review site. I got some great reviews saying how good or awful products were (tip: don't buy Epil-Stop). I would also get a sudden flood of positive reviews on a product. At that time, the fake reviewers weren't too sophisticated so you could tell that the 100 positive reviews from 100 "different people" were coming from the same IP address. I'd junk them but even at the time it was a lot of effort for what was a one man operation. I can sympathize with the comments moderation teams at Yelp, Amazon, and any other place that accepts user comments on products but tries to weed out fake ones.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
What *exactly* have they been fined for? For being wrong on the Internet? There'd be huge financial opportunity in that.
Ezekiel 23:20
Anyone can post anything on the internet, it might not even be true. Whilst perusing the summary, I was misled into thinking that TFA was linked at reuters. But it turns out that I just burned up another instance of the NYT from my monthly allotment. I never get used to it. silly me.
They feared that it could be used to suppress protest or support unpopular rule.
While I know Amazon doesn't write it's own reviews but they do almost nothing to prevent them either. I figure New York, the state of growing debts, is going to hit them next.
This is the best article ever published. It completely fulfilled my need for information and informed commentary.
I am shocked - shocked! - to find that gambling is going on in here!
.
Prisencolinensinainciusol. Ol Rait!
Require reviewers to post a "selfie" with the product, at the place of business, and so on. They should have a profile picture too, naturally.
.
Prisencolinensinainciusol. Ol Rait!
If I could write reviews all day, that's what I'd do. I mean $1/review and if you write 15 reviews in an hour that's $15. Not fantastic wage as my field's competitive wage is $80-$110/hr. but when you're in between jobs looking for a new one since your old company decided to outsource to another country, you're kinda in a bind to pay bills using any means necessary, and yes-- 100 fat chicks for $100 each will do. But what I don't get is what's so illegal about writing fake reviews? The whole movie and game industry is based on fake reviews, bribing companies if you will to write A++ reviews. Why aren't they getting fined? I call bullshit on these attorneys. They're the ones that need to be fined for harassing a business that used a website just as it's expected to be used by nature.
He wasn't charged for IP spoofing.
On January 6, 2011, Swartz was arrested near the Harvard campus by MIT police and a U.S. Secret Service agent. He was arraigned in Cambridge District Court on two state charges of breaking and entering with intent to commit a felony. On July 11, 2011, Swartz was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of wire fraud, computer fraud, unlawfully obtaining information from a protected computer and recklessly damaging a protected computer.
Anyway, just because one facet of a crime is similar to another one, doesn't mean the punishment should be the same.
Do you sometimes wish you'd replied in the right thread?
No, your children are not the special ones. Nor are your pets.
I suspect most people lurking on this site have enough brains and savvy to ferret out many fake reviews posted on such sites, or at least take things with a very large grain of salt.
That is assuming we take the time. Then there is the rest of the population, who may glance at a Yelp! rating and take action from there.
It took me about 2 minutes years ago to conclude that rating sites like this would have a low accuracy rate. Why? I own a small business, and experience the general public first hand.
Further example: on Amazon, people can rate things for sale. A fair % of those ratings have nothing to do with the thing for sale, but with problems like late shipping or damage goods.
I don't anything against the lowest common denomnator, except that it's low and common.
Online reviews? LOL.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
...is cursed.
Maybe he was talking about eating and reviewing yogurts while driving.
There's more than one kind of fake review.
One is just straight up lying, they got paid to post but never actually used the service/product.
The other is the way Apple does it, where just before the release of a new product "independent" tech blogs, and various other bottom feeding scum bubble up to praise their fruity overlords and go full gush on something they have never used (generate false excitement).
Then there are the reviews that while true, they don't allow or they remove bad reviews.
You're better off finding a forum involved in the product and getting information that way, also if you get involved with a bad product/service look into taking a few minutes to complain to the BBB or whatever is appropriate, other wise nothing changes.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
So with that in mind, how about they change their reviews to:
I was paid to write good review by [sleazy marketing co], but they are evil and never sent me any money.
... until all the fake reviewers are in prison for 10 years, and the executives of the businesses doing this in prison for 30 years.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
NOBODY CAN ACCESS THEM. DIE.
Well, yea but, how can we make this Obama's fault?
Discovering fake stuff on the internet is easy. Proving which miscreants posted it is hard.
The investigation sounds a lot like the one Wired wrote up about Google helping people get illegal drug sites high up in the PageRank.
They had recordings from helpdesk people on how to get around it.
Several recordings for (supposedly) different companies to help skirt the rules Google supposedly had in place.
I don't know why people believe stuff they read on the internet. Probably for the same reason they believe stuff sent out on television stations or hollered from pulpits or whispered from ear to ear across backyard fences. Gossip is popular but is only sometimes true.
Believe what I say.
This sting operation is a total waste of time and is itself a fraud, designed to make you think the NY a-g is protecting you. He's not. First of all, this is not a real problem. No one over the age of six is taken in by fake reviews. Second, once burned twice shy--if you are taken in once, you never will be again. No state action needed. Third, the spoofers will find a new way to post fake reviews. Go chase ripoff landlord, Mr. Schneiderman, if you want to do something that will help a lot of people.
That will work well for a lot of personal care products.
"Here's me with my hemorrhoid cream. Notice how easy it is to apply."
I clicked on the article and the Slashdot comments were delivered quickly. Comments were packed perfectly and were easy to read. I couldn't believe how useful Slashdot is in my daily life! I told all my poker buddies and they loved it too! Thank You SlashDot you will see me return for more a lot in the future. Five out of Five Stars
is all I can think of.
it's just not that big a deal, as an analysis of Society's Use Of Yelp (and others) would have determined.
and as some folks have said.. ain't that yelp's problem? are they gonna police online resume sites too?
The way the Brits pronounce 'yoghurt' has always creeped me out; it sounds like said product is backing up on them.
Whereas 'aluminium' sounds as if they've gotten lost halfway through.
i wish i had mod points right now to rate this as flamebait/troll.
alright AC, where's your proof.
Starting a Tor client and using random exit nodes is "advanced"?
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B - D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0 45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
I don't like the tactics, but I think the Attorney General has bigger fish to fry. A lot of politicians and cops that have been violating Constitutional rights, and violating tehri oath of office, so why the hell are resources being wasted on this trivial matter?
Your winnings, sir!
when they banned his IP and MAC address, Aaron Swartz simply changed them both. That's not acting in good faith
You mean kind of like knowing writing fake reviews on Yelp is against their end user agreement so using ip spoofing to avoid detection? Sounds like it's almost the identical thing to me.
Is there another site that is better? I'm not making a tu quoque argument here, I just want alternatives.
Yelp has direct information in their database that an employer forced an employee to spoof a positive review. This same employer was involved in the use of rufinol, aka date-rape, class drugs. The same employer fired someone I know two weeks after their father died for no discernable reason except for stating that she was "sad," and "couldn't she wear [a red cocktail dress, against dress code] to work, then maybe I wouldn't fire her?" Multiple reviews on Yelp related to this, as well as directly to the customer service at this establishment from myself as an individual, were taken down on the flimsiest, or with no, reason.
Yelp's legal counsel should crumple up his memo and swallow it.
I find google reviews to be the most useful. You can even check the person's G+ to see how legit they appear to be.
http://soylentnews.org/~tibman
It's not like you'll be able to identify them by their face in those instances.
"Quote me as saying I was mis-quoted." -Groucho Marx
" The Attorney General's office set up a fake yogurt shop in Brooklyn, New York, and sought help from firms that specialize in boosting online search results to combat negative reviews."
Doesn't this qualify as entrapment by law enforcement?
See also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astroturfing
Not really. IANAL, but I have had lawyers explain this one to me. The sting didn't force the firms to actually do anything illegal. There was always the option of the firm saying "That is not a service we can provide, but here's some services that may help your situation..." then list off services that fall in line with the law. Entrapment only happens when there's coercion to convince someone to do something that they wouldn't normally do. For instance, if the enforcement repeatedly contacted the same firm and specifically asked for the illegal service, and after several refusals, the firm gave in and began setting up an the illegal boosting, if the defense could provide a case that entrapment occurred, the prosecution would have to prove that the firm was predisposed to commit the act in the first place, which would be difficult if the defense had recorded conversations / time-stamps originating from the Sting-Op.
Give him a break: he wrote that while waiting for the light to turn green.
That, according to the cop, is still illegal.
At least for the reviewing part. I do not recall them ever having issues with eating yogurt while driving.
What I find interesting is that while I think it's absolutely obvious that Yelp is useless, I see so many people who swear by it and use Yelp all the time. They either refuse to believe that the reviews are biased or faked or gamed, or that this only happens to places they don't plan to visit and never their local smoothie shops.
Even without the gaming of the system it should be apparent to all that self selected surveys are inaccurate. No one ever takes the time to write a review that says "it was okay I guess". Instead you tend to get two types of responders to these surveys: either they absolutely loved it, or they absolutely hated it. With reviews you get a third category of self selected responders, those who want to write something that looks and feels like a professional review despite having no experience at it.
Now also add in the gaming of the system and it's becomes untrustworthy.
What surprises me is that New York has laws against this. Isn't this just a different type of fiction writing? Free speech is not allowed? I don't see any fraud unless New York City is now the most gullible city in the world.
Why do you need a site for this? If it's a nice restaurant then the local papers should have a review for it. If there is no review then take a chance and just try it out anyway! If it's not a nice restaurant then who cares what the reviews are? Why not just pick a place at random? Will the world end if the service is not the best? I am honestly baffled what people are expecting to find from these sites. Society operated for millenia without Yelp and now suddenly people are unable to find a place to eat without it?
It is nearly impossible to get a good customer generated review. It just will not happen unless you make the review mandatory, otherwise you will only get self selected reviewers.
I typically use yelp on my phone when I'm on vacation or in a new place to find out what's nearby. Local papers are also going to be skewed by bribes and biases. Taking a chance is not really something I want to do. I'm cheap. I don't eat out much: I'm not going to sample ALL the resturaunts even in my city, so why not just sample the best ones? I also like that I can show only cheap restaurants. Just because I'm cheap doesn't mean I don't prefer good food. It's not all about service quality. In fact, I don't care about service. And the recommendations for what to eat at a resturaunt have been good to me in the past. I could and do ask the staff what they recommend, but often they're too timid to actually suggest anything. I get a lot of "Uh, what do you like?"
Look at it this way: if the reviews are so arbitrary, then how is yelp not picking a place at random?
IANAL, but my understanding is that it's only entrapment if the people running the sting encouraged the targets to break the law.
If they contacted the SEO firms and asked for help with a PR campaign (legal), and the SEO firms offered to write fake reviews (illegal), then it's not entrapment because the SEO firms are the ones who made the offer. If, on the other hand, they had asked for help writing fake reviews, then it could be entrapment.
For fucking crying the fuck out loud! These pieces of shit don't prosecute banks when most of their business model is defrauding people out of their actual money but spend a FUCKING YEAR setting up a "sting" operation against people writing fake reviews!!!! ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME!?????!!!!
I've fucking had it. The people who did this are absolute pieces of SHIT.
How much taxpayer money did they spend during the year in order to get this $350,000?
Just turn off JavaScript to keep reading the nyt.
Duh
What surprises me is that New York has laws against this.
The entire US has laws against false advertising. The problem here is that they're so widely ignored in pretty much all other media that it seems a little unequal to crack down on just web advertising.
In other words, the modern legal definition of entrapment is that there's pretty much no such thing as entrapment unless an undercover cop puts a gun to your head to force you to do it, and even that's iffy.
Not my box, but iirc its the same at home, I go to incognito and burn through ten pages, since I haven't bothered to worked out cookie management in the new browser.
They feared that it could be used to suppress protest or support unpopular rule.
A year or two back I posted a review of a food truck that was positive about the product, but negative about some of the business practices of the truck. The vendor complained to Yelp, and they pulled the review because it wasn't just about the product itself. Business practices matter as well, at least they should. And the ease that the vendor had in getting a negative review turfed tells me that nothing on Yelp is to be trusted at all.
"Politicians are interested in people. Not that this is always a virtue. Fleas are interested in dogs." P.J. O'Rourke
I shouldn't have to do this for you since you were replying to AC....
Try this link: www.yelp.com
No brain, no pain.
that's an assertion without proof. i thought the posters (yes, even AC ones) were better than that on Slashdot.
I had a yelp account, they censored negative images of the business I posted. I deleted my account. They are useless shills who police their users more than their businesses.