Google and TripAdvisor, online review platforms, have blocked reviews in Russia and Ukraine after the users left messages to protest against the ongoing war. These two review giants received an influx of fake reviews that led them to block users from posting any new reviews.
It was last week that an “Anonymous” sent out a tweet, addressing the people to leave fake reviews on Russian restaurants and businesses, in an attempt to warn their fellow citizens about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. ‘Anonymous’ is an international group of hackers, having 7.7m followers. The tweet read, “Go to Google maps. Go to Russia. Find a restaurant or business and write a review. When you write the review explain what is happening in Ukraine.”
The tweet also included a Russian message as an example text for people to use: “The food was great! Unfortunately, Putin spoiled our appetites by invading Ukraine. Stand up to your dictator, stop killing innocent people! Your government is lying to you. Get up!”
So far, the tweet amasses thousands of comments, where people confess to leaving fake reviews for everything related to Russia such as hotels, restaurants, karaoke bars, law firms, etc.
“Leave 5-star reviews (unless it’s Russian State-owned, then feel free to leave 1-star ratings),” wrote one.
“The point is to push information to the Russian civilian population being lied to by Putin. But be careful,” said a second, “Do not leave any personal information and consider to vary the text templates provided here (otherwise they can be easily filtered automatically)”. While someone commented, “The power of social media.”
Google & TripAdvisor Disable Restaurant Reviews
The campaign was a huge success that Google had to disable the reviews for the time being. Following Google, TripAdvisor also disabled the users from leaving any reviews for Russian establishments.
After disabling the review section, there’s a message on the site that reads, “Due to a recent event that has attracted media attention and has caused an influx of review submissions that do not describe a first-hand experience. We have temporarily suspended publishing new reviews for this listing. If you’ve had a first-hand experience at this property, please check back soon – we’re looking forward to receiving your review!”
Temporarily suspending new reviews on Russian businesses and restaurants, TripAdvisor instills preventive measures as they closely monitor the incoming reviews. The spokesperson of the online company said in an interview, “We will take steps to apply what we call ‘lockdown notices’ whenever a property receives an influx of review submissions that do not describe first-hand customer experiences.”
He further added, “Due to a recent increase in contributed content on Google Maps related to the war in Ukraine, we’ve put additional protections in place to monitor and prevent content that violates our policies for Maps, including temporarily blocking new reviews, photos, and videos in the region.”
Thus, in the wake of the deepening Russia-Ukraine crisis, Google and TripAdvisor have blocked users to add new reviews to the listings in Russia.
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