Mozilla Corporation made an official statement about the acquisition of Fakespot, a startup that developed a website and browser plugin for recognizing commissioned or deliberately false reviews. These tools will allow users to identify fake reviews on various web resources, such as the travel review site TripAdvisor, the well-known e-commerce platform Amazon, and many others. Information about the amount spent by Mozilla and the terms of the purchase is not disclosed.
Fakespot was founded in New York in 2016 by Saoud Khalifah. In developing the service's detection capabilities, its experts used both AI and ML. Using these technologies, they were able to identify patterns and reveal certain similarities in the reviews left by users on websites. As a result, they distinguished those reviews that can be characterized as false with the highest probability. Fakespot's tools assign a rating or rank to product reviews. This information helps the buyer make a purchase decision based on real data and comments. The main function of the browser plugin detector and website is to provide all users with the ability to instantly recognize fake reviews that have inflated the product's rating.
Mozilla noted that soon, everyone who uses the Firefox browser will have access to the review detector, which will provide them with a more high-quality and honest shopping experience. The implementation of this tool in the browser will significantly improve the experience of online shoppers in e-commerce.