Centre to hold meeting with e-commerce companies in regards of fake reviews
The consumer affairs ministry and the Advertising Standards Council of India will hold a virtual meeting with stakeholders including e-commerce entities to discuss the magnitude of fake reviews on their platforms, which is misleading the consumers into buying online products and services.
The discussions will be broadly based on the impact of fake and misleading reviews on consumers and possible measures to prevent such anomalies. The screening results underlines that at least 55 percent of the websites violate the unfair commercial practices directive of the EU, which requires truthful information to be presented to consumers to make an informed choice.
E-commerce entities like Flipkart, Amazon, Tata Sons, Reliance Retail and others, besides consumer forums, law universities, lawyers, FICCI, CII, consumer rights activists, etc. to participate in the meeting.
The secretary said in the letter that consumers are increasingly shopping online for purchase of goods and services with growing internet and smartphone use. “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 to see the opinion and experience of users who have already purchased the goods or service,” he said.
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, he added.
See What’s Next in Tech With the Fast Forward Newsletter
Tweets From @varindiamag
Nothing to see here - yet
When they Tweet, their Tweets will show up here.