
“Amazon’s choice” recommends fraudulent listing - bryced
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07T8LGWQ5/
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jedimastert
Two interesting things from this, I think:

1\. This goes a long way to show that there isn't probably zero human
interaction with the "Amazon's Choice" listings and that it's completely
algorithmic.

2\. Making fraudulent listings on Amazon is extremely effective. So effective
that it can be sent to the top of the charts.

My question is this: even if the listing gets removed, I'm sure it's been up
long enough to make an insane amount of money, probably far more than they
paid for the review-bots or the stock (if they even sell the correct thing).
If they get the listing removed and "banned," what's to stop them from making
another shell corp and doing it all again? What's the barrier for entry for
fraudulent listings?

Tangentially related, if "Amazon's Choice" is based on reviews and popularity,
what stops it from becoming an echo chamber? Age of product doesn't seem like
a good factor, nor time spent in the amazon choice spot.

~~~
shakyshakyshaky
I've known an amazon worker who worked on the amazon's choice functionality at
one point- it's all algorithmic with little to no human interaction. It's also
skewed towards the products amazon stands to profit the most off of,
obviously.

~~~
jedimastert
I wonder goes into the "most profit" number between items in the same category
besides "best seller"...

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rfwhyte
Amazon desperately needs to fix their completely broken third-party
marketplace. There are entire categories of products I simply won't buy from
Amazon as its near impossible to find anything that even approximates an
authentic listing with genuine reviews. Yet Amazon does nothing. Amazon
genuinely doesn't care that their customers are regularly getting ripped off,
given they get their cut regardless.

The depressing thing is that there's probably some Amazon employee sitting at
a desk in Seattle or somewhere, who keeps a meticulous model that tracks and
compares their losses from returns on fraudulent listings vs. what it would
cost them in effort and what they'd lose in commissions from actually doing
something about the issue, and Amazon execs have basically decided that since
they're making more money from running a marketplace that enables fraud, its
somehow justified to continue enabling fraud.

Its basically the same situation as that Ford Pinto case from the 80s where
Ford used a cost-benefit analysis to decide that it would be cheaper to settle
cases where people were injured or died as a result of a faulty fuel-system,
rather than redesign said system.

Hopefully at some point another marketplace with much higher standards and far
greater customer protections will emerge and eat into Amazon's market share
forcing them to take the issue seriously.

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bryced
1600 reviews, almost a perfect rating. The reviews and questions are about
other products like a bread machine. I reviewed the product as 1-star but my
review doesn’t show up. I reported this listing to amazon several days ago but
it remains.

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avensec
Webcache since it is now removed. You can still see the strange reviews, but
this cache does not have the "Amazon's choice" label.

[https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:HeZP55...](https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:HeZP55iEDpAJ:https://www.amazon.com/Adapter-
Compatible-Splitter-Headphone-Charger/dp/B07T8LGWQ5+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us)

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mox1
This actually sums up a lot of the problems with amazon in one nice little
listing.

Edit:

This is actually more fun:
[https://www.amazon.com/stores/node/13968870011?_encoding=UTF...](https://www.amazon.com/stores/node/13968870011?_encoding=UTF8&field-
lbr_brands_browse-bin=my-handy-design&ref_=bl_dp_s_web_13968870011)

All of the product have either 5 stars with hundreds of reviews or 0-1 starts
with tens of reviews...

~~~
bryced
yeah here is another one. why didn't they take down the whole seller?
[https://www.amazon.com/Charger-Braided-Charging-Syncing-
Comp...](https://www.amazon.com/Charger-Braided-Charging-Syncing-
Compatible/dp/B07S74HNGR?ref_=bl_dp_s_web_13968870011) edit: put correct link

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sp332
Did they just copy 5-star reviews from other products verbatim? Or do they
keep updating this listing and changing the product for sale entirely?

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izzydata
Amazon is such a mess. Do they have any incentive to punish abusers and
prevent this from continuing?

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erikerikson
PoC exploit of "Amazon's Choice" algorithm?

