Bring endorsers, influencers and bloggers in policy to protect consumers from fake reviews: CAIT

Traders' body CAIT has requested the government to bring brand endorsers, social media influencers and bloggers under the proposed framework to protect online consumers from fake reviews of products and services.

According to the PTI report, the Confederation of All India Traders (CAIT) also argued that the rating of a product or service should be made a part of the policy framework for reviews.

The government is working on a standard operating procedure (SoP) to protect online consumers from fake reviews of products and services.

Consumer Affairs Secretary Rohit Kumar Singh in May held a virtual meeting with stakeholders to discuss the impact of fake and misleading reviews on online consumers and preparation of a roadmap to prevent such a situation, wrote PTI.

The traders' body urged the government for an early rollout of a well-defined and robust policy to protect consumers from fake and deceptive reviews for products.

It said such reviews influence the choice of consumers to a great extent thereby constituting an act to cheat the consumers by depriving them of getting the right value for their spending.

"In this context, the brand endorsers, social media influencers, bloggers on goods and services should be brought under the ambit of policy on fake and deceptive reviews," CAIT stated.

CAIT Secretary General Praveen Khandelwal opined that in the current scenario, the trend of purchasing from e-commerce sites is increasing day by day and in the absence of having a physical touch and feel experience, reviews and ratings of goods and services assume significance in impacting the choice of consumers.