Amazon fake reviews came from Bangladesh, China, the Philippines and the UK, investigation finds

Amazon is suing more than 1,000 reviewers for selling fake review writing services

A spokesman for Amazon said they were cracking down on the practice

A significant proportion of the fake reviews that are being targeted by Amazon in a lawsuit are from Bangladesh, China and the Philippines, according to reports.

Amazon is suing more than 1,000 reviewers for selling fake review writing services through Fiverr.com, an online marketplace for freelance writers. Such writers signed up to the site to advertise that they would write positive reviews of products and books for cash, skewing the ratings system that Amazon relies on.

Writers’ profiles have since been deleted, but the Times searched through 50 cached profiles and found that “a significant minority” came from Bangladesh, with others from China and the Philippines.

The Britons accused of writing fake reviews did not advertise the service on their Fiverr profiles, but one “stay-at-home mom and a pastor’s wife” said she would write a high quality product review within 12 hours, the Times reported.

A spokesman for Amazon said they were cracking down on the practice to make reviews as useful as possible for customers.

“We use a number of mechanisms to detect and remove the small fraction of reviews that violate our guidelines, and we terminate accounts. We’ve recently filed lawsuits against a number of individuals and businesses who were abusing the system,” the spokesman said.