Amazon says it has permanently banned 600 Chinese brands for review fraud

Remember when gadget vendors Aukey, Mpow, RavPower, Vava, TaoTronics, and Choetech began mysteriously disappearing from Amazon’s online storefront, and it turned out that Amazon had intentionally taken them down while vaguely doing sign of the sanctity of its user reviews? It turns out they were just the tip of the iceberg. Amazon has now permanently banned more than 600 Chinese brands on 3,000 different seller accounts, the company confirms to The edge.

Amazon says it’s the big tally after five months of its global crackdown, and it’s no longer hesitating to explain why: A spokesperson tells us those 600 brands have been banned for knowingly, repeatedly, and violating Significantly Amazon’s policies, especially those regarding review abuse.

The South China Morning Post the figures reported earlier, citing an interview with an Amazon Asia vice president on public television.

The Amazon crackdown began amid reporting by The Wall Street Journal Nicole Ngyuen on how companies like RavPower offered gift cards in exchange for reviews.

I have also collected cards like this. Amazon banned the practice of incentive reviews in 2016, but it’s a tricky business: some of those offers are disguised as a VIP test program or extended warranty. Other companies only offer incentives after you leave a bad review – they’ll either give you a free product or offer a free money “refund”, no returns required, as long as you remove your negative review.

It’s unclear what other Chinese brands might be included in Amazon’s latest crackdown – and it’s quite possible that some of their products are slipping Amazon’s net. Even though Aukey was one of the first high-profile companies to be banned in May, the company was still selling headphones under a sub-brand in July, and you can always buy a pair on Amazon, even today. I also found a Choetech wireless charger and a RavPower battery. We’ve asked Amazon to explain its ban dodging policies, and we’ll let you know what we hear.

In early July, Shenzhen parent company Youkeshu Technology (more commonly known as YKS) announced that Amazon had closed 340 of YKS ‘online stores and frozen more than $ 20 million of its assets, according to the South China Morning Post. The post described YKS as one of the platform’s biggest Chinese retailers.

Here is Amazon’s full statement:

Amazon is working hard to create a great experience in our store so that customers can shop with confidence and sellers have the opportunity to grow their business under healthy competition. Customers rely on the accuracy and authenticity of product reviews to make informed purchasing decisions and we have clear policies for reviewers and business partners that prohibit abuse of our community’s features. We suspend, prohibit and initiate legal proceedings against those who violate these policies, wherever they are in the world.

We will continue to improve detection of abuse and take enforcement action against bad actors, including those who knowingly engage in multiple and repeated rule violations, including review abuse. We believe that the actions we take are in the best interests of our customers as well as the honest businesses that make up the vast majority of our global sales community.