Apple removes ‘Fakespot’ app from iOS App Store following Amazon request
9to5mac.com
9to5mac.com
It does a lot of things completely opaque to the normal end user that are well above a "please tell me if item X's reviews are good or bad" - it practically sends Fakespot almost every single page interaction or click that you do on an Amazon property.
It does the same on every other site it supports - whether or not you want your item inspected, it will notify Fakespot about what products you viewed, what browser, what you clicked on, Add to Cart or Buy Now clicks, Sort clicks, every product visible on page (by ID and seller).
They also use the same unique session identifier across sites, so items you look at on eBay/Walmart/etc can be tied to the same person as items viewed on Amazon. If you choose to try to opt out of automatic item detection, that choice is also sent back to their servers (where it then returns a 4xx and tells you to sign up or sign in to fakespot with an account to save settings).
The extension itself is many megabytes of heavily packed and obfuscated JS. If you have it installed, I would recommend not doing so.
> When you use our Services, we automatically collect the following information about you:
> User ID: ... User ID also includes your account password, other credentials, security questions, and confirmation codes.
And a cherry on top, first-party ads:
> Purchase Information: Your purchase history or purchase tendencies which we may use to recommend better products and sellers.
0: https://www.fakespot.com/privacy-policy#:~:text=User%20ID%20...
Fakespot Fake Amazon Reviews and eBay Sellers collects the following:
Personally identifiable information For example: name, address, email address, age, or identification number
Authentication information For example: passwords, credentials, security question, or personal identification number (PIN)
Location For example: region, IP address, GPS coordinates, or information about things near the user’s device
Web history The list of web pages a user has visited, as well as associated data such as page title and time of visit
User activity For example: network monitoring, clicks, mouse position, scroll, or keystroke logging
Website content For example: text, images, sounds, videos, or hyperlinks
In the year before the date this policy was issued, on the Services we may have collected the following categories of California Information:
Address and other identifiers -- such as name, postal address, zip code, email address, account name, payment card numbers, or other similar identifiers
Unique and online identifiers -- such as IP address, device IDs, or other similar identifiers
Characteristics of protected classifications -- such as race, ethnicity, or sexual orientation
Commercial information -- such as products or services purchased, obtained, or considered, or other purchasing or consuming histories or tendencies
Internet, gaming or other electronic network activity information -- such as browsing history, search history and information regarding an individual's interaction with an internet website, application, or advertisement
Professional or educational Information
Biometric information
Location information -- (e.g. if you access our Sites on your mobile device we may collect Information about your device's precise location.)
Online viewing activities (e.g. pages viewed)
Inferences drawn from California Information, such as individual profiles, preferences, characteristics, behaviors.
They process no payments and have no fraud to speak of, because it's not a thing.
This company should not exist.
What this fakespot (i had no idea it existed until today) is doing is NOT different from what apple/google/facebook and other data brokers are doing. I'm horrified it exists and would gladly participate in setting those corporations on fire, but at the same time i'm even more horrified when they destroy their own competition in the name of protecting us users, because it's a shameful hypocrisy.
It's basically like the police killing random citizens (mostly not those who are white/rich) then saying they have a monopoly on legitimate violence. The first situation is already terrible, but that they fight competition in their crimes against humanity is all the more reason to dismantle these entities.
The more interesting questions is, why is Apple complying? Are they afraid that Amazon will retaliate by pulling their apps out of the App Store? If so, are they really just going to keep prioritizing big tech connections in favor of it's own customers?
The rule cited is so vague that even a basic paid browser app would break it. All the app does is augment data available from any web browser with other data.
> 5.2.2 Third-Party Sites/Services: If your app uses, accesses, monetizes access to, or displays content from a third-party service, ensure that you are specifically permitted to do so under the service’s terms of use. Authorization must be provided upon request.
I don’t think Apple is afraid of Amazon or anyone else. It just makes sense to side with a fellow Goliath than with some unknown app. There is no upside in siding with fakespot. It is highly unethical, but otherwise it is just business as usual
This is not to say that Amazon reviews are generally good, just saying that Fakespot might have an incentive to... tune their reviews of reviews :) so where's the Fakespot of Fakespot?
So basically any time you need something where the concept of fakes doesn't matter or is removed entirely.
Otherwise Amazon is a hulking pile of scams and garbage
They most likely are trying to get users first, and then look money printing opportunities later.
ReviewMeta, on the other hand, is clearly donation based, and also seems more honest at the moment (e.g., not claiming to be some sort of “trusted advisor”, showing a big warning that it’s adjusted score is only an estimation).
[1]: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/fakespot-fake...
Now, I shop on Amazon, using most helpful critical reviews only, and buy either local, or direct from manufacturers.
Most times shipping is comparable to Amazon’s “not really two day two day shipping”
Also, Streisand effect in play here for sure. Now I know about FakeSpot. Thanks!
They are either highly incompetent or unethical. Or both.
Not Apple also?
It was recommeded along with fakespot by some users for identifying fake amazon reviews when it was asked on my problem validation platform[1].
Amazon says,
> According to Amazon, the company already has the necessary tools to identify and stop fake reviews, suggesting that third-party services that claim to do this “are mostly wrong.”
If that was the case, People wouldn't be actively looking for solutions.
[1] https://needgap.com/problems/42-identifying-fake-reviews-in-...
Should never been in the app store to begin with!
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/infuse-7/id1136220934
Video: 3GP AVI ASF BDMV DIVX DVDMEDIA DVR-MS FLV ISO/IMG M2TS M4V MKV MOV MP4 MPEG MTS MXF OGM OGV TS VIDEO_TS WEBM WMV WTV
I’d be curious what it is, if not. VLC is missing codecs on Windows store too:
https://itigic.com/normal-vlc-vs-microsoft-store-vlc-differe...
This is also ignoring that Apple don't deem it useful for you to be able to rename file extensions, which wouldn't have been a problem if I hadn't copied it as a .vkm instead of mkv
For now.
Fakespot was doing the job Amazon has failed to do for years and was the only thing keeping me there.
Thanks Amazon for finally making this breakup a done deal.
I just hadn't made the call. This is what radicalized me.
Review Meta does a similar thing and its iOS app seems to be still available: https://reviewmeta.com
The business model was to find items people are browsing on Amazon and then find a drop shipping niche ?
It's a "walled prison".
If you want to move to Android, you'll have to buy a new device and spend maybe $100 on apps, but most services support both platforms. Yes it'll suck to lose that one "killer app", but there's likely alternatives that are almost as good.
Changing ecosystems is always a viable option.
How much more for the everyday person?
Most regular users use a small number of services (Facebook, reddit, whatever) and that will be available across both platforms.
Something like exporting email from one account to another will be more difficult for the regular user, but there's many guides available online. Or more realistically, a nephew to do it for them.
Similarly, I’m sure there are plenty of people who continue going to a McDonald’s drive-thru instead of a competitors’ because they are comfortable with and familiar with the menu. Yeah no one would accuse McDonald of having any amount of “platform” lock in.
Mirrors on the ceiling / The pink champagne on ice
And she said "We are all just prisoners here, of our own device"
And in the master's chambers / They gathered for the feast
They stab it with their steely knives But they just can't kill the beast
Last thing I remember / I was running for the door
I had to find the passage back to the place I was before
"Relax," said the night man / "We are programmed to receive
You can check-out any time you like / But you can never leave!"
I know this is unrelated to reviews, but I got a product shipped by and from Amazon 2 weeks ago that was missing its original box but instead was in an unmarked box that still had a shipping label addressed to Amazon returns on it.
Amazon gives so few shits about product quality it's baffling
Still though they have the best selection on certain things and a generous return policy.
I can’t honestly blame them for errors when they do so much business that 1 in a million problems happen daily.
> According to Amazon, the company already has the necessary tools to identify and stop fake reviews, suggesting that third-party services that claim to do this “are mostly wrong.”
I am certainly willing to believe that Amazon has all the necessary tools, but it's very clear that they don't care to use them.
So what if Amazon can or even does do it? There should be multiple apps offering the same service available to Apple customers. This doesn't make sense.
.
Also, If its not profit, there must be some 'perverse incentive' at some level of the company to act as they do.
People are catching on to the low quality of the reviews on amazon and once that credibility is gone, its never coming back.
Their supply chain is a pretty strong moat but its not insurmountable.
Incidentally, I had also been in contact with Facebook about a role "combatting abuse" across their services. That loop was a bait and switch for standard ML (eg, improve video recommendations for users to keep their eyeballs on FB).
I try to assume good intentions, but I'm constantly given evidence that there are no good intentions in these companies. I don't think Amazon really has any reason to combat fake reviews. And I know a good number of engineers and scientists there. It's a tractable problem.
Had they moved quickly and decisively I probably would have given them another chance.
Just downloaded fakespot.
Out of curiosity can one or two readers with the Fakespot App go to my product page and see what the App reports. Preferably two people, just to see if there is randomness to the result. This assumes you can still use an app that has been removed from the App store. Or is it automatically deleted from your phone ?
I don't believe Fakespot's ratings are useful, though, because for other sites I've gotten for a negative-feedback seller "seller is RELIABLE and APPROVED BY FAKESPOT" when the API response consists entirely of "Seller has a return policy" and nothing else.
If you go on eBay for example, any seller that says "accepts returns" will automatically be flagged trustworthy.
https://www.fakespot.com/product/garagemate-open-your-garage...
It gives an A rating.
Thank you Amazon, for bringing this awesome service to my attention!
Even after these antitrust cases they still won’t change. They always find a way.