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How fake online reviews can ruin a business: A special Crikey Inq investigation

Crikey’s Inq investigation team have been digging deep into the swirling sewer of Australian online reviews, and how they affect businesses.
Eloise Keating
Eloise Keating
ANZ scam

Do you ever read the online reviews about your business? How often are they accurate — and how often are they scurrilous and defamatory?

Do you recall the times when small business owners have lost their livelihoods, and suffered personally, at the hands of online reviewers? Or those businesses that have been forced to deal with competitors undermining or attacking them by posting fake reviews

This week, over at our sister publication Crikey, the Inq investigation team have been digging deep into the swirling sewer of Australian online reviews. 

They looked at the legal situation that allows thousands of outrageous reviews about businesses and individuals to flourish.

Their legal writer Michael Bradley explains what you can do to address this business-damaging phenomenon.

The team looked at recent court cases as a guide to what some business owners are doing to stamp it out.

And they pulled together a catalogue of disgraceful online reviews to illustrate this pernicious trend.

It makes for fascinating reading on a topic that is too important for Australian business owners to ignore.

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