To weed out 'fake reviews' on e-comm sites, govt plans meet with cos today

NEW DELHI: In a fresh offensive against e-commerce companies, the consumer affairs ministry has taken up the issue of "fake reviews" on some of these platforms, suspecting that companies maybe incentivising such reviews which often mislead consumers into buying products or services.
The ministry in association with the Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) has convened a meeting with representatives of top e-commerce firms, consumer organisations and legal experts on Friday to gauge the magnitude of the issue and the way forward to prevent this.
In a letter addressed to e-commerce entities and industry bodies, Union consumer affairs secretary Rohit Kumar Singh has said his ministry has come to know that many a times fake and misleading reviews are posted on online platforms leading to a "likelihood of false and deceptive" description of products in the mind of consumers. He has said this prevents consumers from making an informed decision at the pre-purchase stage.
Singh has enclosed a statement of the European Commission highlighting results of an EU-wide website screening on online consumer reviews across 223 major sites. The screening results highlight that at least 55% of the websites "do not inform" consumers of how reviews are collected and processed. The EU said only 84 websites make such information accessible to consumers on the review page itself. The statement said 188 of the 223 sites did not contain information about how the fake reviews are prevented and 176 sites do not mention that incentivised reviews are prohibited by their internal policies.
Recently, the ministry warned online cab aggregators to address consumer grievances and disclose the mechanism they follow for fare fixation and levying cancellation charges. It has also called the restaurants owners association next week on the issue of collecting service charge as a part of the bill.
Singh said, "With growing internet and smartphone use, consumers are increasingly shopping online... Given that e-commerce involves a virtual shopping experience without any opportunity to physically view or examine the product, consumers heavily rely on reviews posted on e-commerce platforms... 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."