Are you one of those who chooses a restaurant based on its number of stars? This scoring system is not without hitches…and without crooks. In yet another web scam attempt, restaurants across the United States have been targeted in recent weeks by a coordinated extortion campaign. On condition of anonymity, individuals are leaving negative ratings on restaurant Google pages as a bargaining chip to extort digital gift cards.
From San Francisco to New York, several renowned Michelin-starred restaurants said they had received a series of one-star ratings on Google, without descriptions or photos, from people they said had never eaten in their restaurants, reports the New York Times.
the modus operandi is always the same: restaurants receive a barrage of one-star reviews on Google. Shortly after, the owners receive an email from someone asking for a $75 Google Play gift card to remove the reviews, or more bad ratings will follow.
The message is also always the same, according to the American daily: “We sincerely apologize for our actions and would not want to harm your business, but we have no other choice”.
The email goes on to say that the sender lives in India and the resale value of the gift card could provide several weeks of income for his family.
Google responded to widespread complaints from restaurant owners on Friday by posting a notice on the Google Business Help forum saying it was aware of the issue and was taking action.
“Our policies are clear that reviews should be based on real experiences, and our teams are working around the clock to thwart these attacks, remove fraudulent reviews and put in place protections on business profiles that may have been affected,” reads the notice, which asks restaurant owners not to pay scammers, but instead to seek Google’s assistance.
No coordinated attacks in Quebec
So far, the Quebec Restoration Association (ARQ) has not heard of such a coordinated extortion campaign. Rather, it reports cases, more or less recent, where individuals take possession of the Google business account of certain restaurants to indicate that it is temporarily closed, in exchange for a sum of money.
In other cases, customers use the Google rating system to get reimbursed for meals. However, there is no question of coordinated approaches as we can see in the United States, explains Martin Vézina, vice-president of public and governmental affairs for the ARQ.
For Mr. Vézina, the Google rating system remains important, since “some consumers rely on these opinions to make a decision” and such coordinated attacks could lower the overall average of a restaurant.
An establishment that is not yet sufficiently known could be hit harder, he adds.
In such circumstances, “we would recommend to our members not to respond to demand and to customers to no longer rely on the stars,” explains Mr. Vézina. He believes that if Google doesn’t correct it, the ratings process just won’t mean anything.