Is a Bad Actor Targeting You? Detect and Protect Yourself From the Latest Amazon Threat

You have a target on your back. If you read this blog regularly, you are likely a high-volume seller, which makes other sellers want what you have. That’s normal competition. What is not normal is how sellers are going about it these days. As if dealing with Amazon’s complexities is not enough, sellers now must detect and protect themselves from bad actors who are deliberately utilizing tactics to get their unsuspecting victims removed from the platform.

There are dozens of tricks, but these are the ones we see the most often — and what you can do about them:

1. Review manipulation

2. Fraudulent IP takedowns

3. Listing mischief

Review Manipulation

I am not talking about the kind of review manipulation that Amazon normally suspends sellers for, which is compensating buyers for reviews or other tactics that sellers utilize to grow reviews on their own accounts.

Bad actors are leaving fake reviews on competitor’s products — either obviously fake and 5-star or negative 1-stars chock full of bad keywords like “fake, harm, fear, safety, sick, counterfeit.” These reviews are intended to trigger the algorithm and take you out for either fake reviews, product safety, or quality issues.

In another bad move, they are stealing positive reviews from old products and merging them into their brand new competitive listing, so they suddenly have hundreds of reviews compared to your dozens. A case I worked on this week had a bad actor selling for less than six months on the platform with more than 150 reviews on a pet supplement that sprang up overnight. When I read the older reviews, I discovered that the product used to be a cat toy in 2018 and a pet chew toy in 2017. There were, in fact, only about five reviews for the current product. Buzzfeed calls this tactic “brushing” and it is rampant on the platform right now.

Detect

Most of our clients do not detect these activities until it is too late, and they need to be reinstated. Afterward, we set them up with a detection process that involves daily and weekly monitoring:

• Real-time alerts for ASIN changes so the seller can act quickly
• Product reviews, both positive and negative
• Seller reviews, both positive and negative
• The returns report so sellers can see what the buyers are saying and look for patterns
• Buyer-seller messages; the buyers sometimes leave their algorithm triggering comments in emails to you
• Amazon fee changes – your product is suddenly bigger and/or heavier than before, costing you all your profit margin in a product
• Category changes

Once you know what you are looking for, you can detect problems before Amazon suspends you or your listings. It is important to note that nothing can detect fraudulent IP complaints ahead of time or stop a suspension for counterfeit — Amazon has zero tolerance for these complaints. Really bad safety complaints are also usually “one strike and you’re out” if they involve someone getting sick, a rash, a product catching on fire, etc.

Protect

Regular monitoring and detecting are the first line of defense against bad actors. Next is fighting back and letting them know you are not an easy target. The most common ways to fight include:

• Filing “Report a Violation” cases
• Telling Amazon what is going on before they take you down, which is especially important for fake 5-star reviews
• Owning intellectual property; many sellers lose their rights because they did not trademark their brands, copyrights, design patents or utility patents.
• Amazon’s Project Zero program: Three tactics in one designed to stamp out counterfeit.
• Amazon’s Exclusives program: For the right seller, this is an excellent way to get extra marketing support from Amazon and unofficial brand gating.
• Lawsuits: Our clients have filed numerous business and IP lawsuits against bad actors and won. This is not the fastest way to resolve a problem, but it is very effective. If you win, you will get Amazon’s support and take out a bad actor.

Reporting a violation does not always work. Sometimes Amazon ignores our cases, but at least it is free, and they act swiftly if they are going to act. The mistakes most sellers make when filing violations are not building a solid case for Amazon or overwhelming them with unnecessary information. You need evidence and reasonable reasons for your suspicions.

If you detect someone leaving fake positive reviews on your listing, you need to report it immediately to Amazon. File a case asking them to remove the listings because they are fake and make it clear that you did not do this. This will not stop you from being suspended for fake reviews (the algorithm works independently of Seller Support and Seller Performance), but it will make it easier to get back. You can point to the case you filed and say “See? I told you they were fake!” It works.

For negative reviews, it is nearly impossible to get them removed unless you can somehow prove that the reviewers are bogus or were incentivized to leave a bad review. That’s always a tough one. Sometimes we can find that proof and sometimes we can’t.

Awareness is half the battle against bad actors. Once you know what they are doing, you can fight back. Once you know how they do it, you can collect evidence. If you are not already monitoring your account weekly for the items listed above, start now. Do not let the bad guys catch you unaware.