Fighting fake reviews: Authenticated anonymous reviews using identity verification

Abstract

Fake reviews have become a pervasive problem in the realm of online commerce, affecting businesses and consumers alike. These fraudulent reviews can cause significant damage to the credibility of companies and negatively impact consumer welfare. While various platforms, such as Yelp and Amazon, have implemented measures to combat fake reviews, these efforts have been largely ineffective and, at times, even exacerbated the problem. As a result, on November 8, 2022, the Federal Trade Commission announced that it is soliciting input for possible regulations around ways to fight fake reviews. The growing sophistication of Artificial Intelligence—particularly generative AI technologies like ChatGPT—worsens the problem by enabling the production of human-like fake reviews at an unprecedented scale. This lends new urgency to the fake review problem, so it is imperative to examine the pros and cons of extant approaches and propose alternative approaches that are better equipped to tackle the issue. In this article, we introduce a novel approach using digital identity verification, which involves verifying a user’s identity via various forms of digital information that represent the individual and have not been applied to online reviews. We highlight the limitations of extant techniques and outline ways in which digital identity verification may be a promising solution to the problem of fake reviews. Potential benefits and challenges, as well as the effectiveness of our proposed approach in addressing the issue of fake reviews, are discussed.