AS many as one in seven top-rated hotels on TripAdvisor have had their profiles boosted by fake reviews according to a new investigation by Which? Travel.
And the consumer advocate says the travel company is failing to stop fake reviews boosting the rankings of these properties.
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The watchdog analysed almost 250,000 reviews for the top ten ranked hotels in ten popular tourist destinations around the world.
It found one in seven had “blatant hallmarks” of fake reviews.
Which? Travel reported 15 cases to TripAdvisor and claimed that the site admitted that 14 of them had already been caught with fake positive reviews in the last year.
It said TripAdvisor revealed that six of these hotels had been penalised for breaking guidelines and two had previously been given a “red badge” warning for suspicious activity, but this was not made clear to travellers.
Which? said TripAdvisor had taken down hundreds of reviews following its investigation.
One hotel in the Middle East, rated as the “best hotel” in Jordan, had a “hugely suspicious” pattern of reviews, Which? reported, adding that the unnamed hotel denied any wrongdoing but TripAdvisor subsequently removed 730 of its five-star ratings.
At the “best hotel in Cairo”, according to TripAdvisor’s traveller rankings, some 79 per cent of five-star reviews were left by profiles that had made no other contributions on the site.
Shortly after Which? shared its findings, TripAdvisor removed reviews from the property and it lost its status as Cairo’s best hotel, the watchdog said.
In Las Vegas, two of the ten highest-ranked hotels received almost half (48 per cent and 41 per cent) of their hundreds of five-star ratings from first-time reviewers who had never made any other TripAdvisor contributions before or since, raising suspicions that they could be fake, Which? said.
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In contrast, another hotel near the top of the Las Vegas rankings had just three per cent of its almost 2,000 five-star reviews from once-only reviewers.
Which? Travel also compared ten London hotels at the two biggest UK chains, Premier Inn and Travelodge.
While Premier Inn did not arouse suspicion, almost half of the hundreds of five-star reviews at two Travelodges came from first-time contributors who had never reviewed anywhere else.
The findings come as the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) is carrying out a programme of work aimed at tackling the increasing problem of fake and misleading reviews.
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Which? Travel’s Naomi Leach said: “TripAdvisor’s failure to stop fake reviews and take strong action against hotels that abuse the system risks misleading millions of travellers and potentially ruining their holidays.
“Sites like TripAdvisor must do more to ensure the information on their platforms is reliable, and if they continue to fall short they should be compelled to make changes so holidaymakers are no longer at risk of being duped by a flood of fake reviews.”
A TripAdvisor spokesman said: “It is simply far too simplistic to assume all first-time reviewers are suspicious. Every genuine reviewer in the world is at some point a first-time reviewer.
“Accurate fraud detection requires analysis of a wide range of data-points, such as IP information, location data or details about the device an account was using when submitting a review. This crucial data is missing from Which’s analysis.
“We are committed to ensuring reviews on TripAdvisor offer useful and accurate information, and we are very aggressive in catching fake reviews and pursuing the fraudsters behind them.
“We have a dedicated team of fraud investigators who work tirelessly to protect the site from fake reviews.”
A Travelodge spokeswoman said: “We did experience a breakdown in our internal communication when TripAdvisor identified an irregular pattern of reviews at one of our hotels – Wembley Central Travelodge.
“Unfortunately on this rare occasion that matter was not managed effectively within the timeframe, and we have taken appropriate action to ensure this does not happen again.”
Last year, Sun Online Travel reported that writing a fake review on TripAdvisor could now land you in jail.
Earlier this year, the travel website started flagging warnings about sexual assault on reviews.
We previously revealed some of the worst TripAdvisor reviews of all time.
