Certify fake and defamatory reviews with EU and international legal validity
When a negative, defamatory, or fraudulent online review damages the reputation of your business, professionalism, or products, it is fundamental to forensically certify the review before it is modified, deleted, or becomes contestable. With forensic review certification, defamatory content is acquired through verifiable technical methodologies and transformed into an opposable, intact, and timestamped evidentiary package, compliant with the legal requirements of the European and international regulatory framework.
We certify reviews on any platform: Google Reviews, TripAdvisor, Trustpilot, Yelp, Amazon, Facebook, Booking.com, TheFork, and any site that allows public reviews. The service can be performed remotely for clients in any European and non-European country, preserving forensic integrity and evidentiary value.
Why Screenshots of Reviews Are Not Enough
- A screenshot of a review is easily manipulable with graphic editing tools and is regularly contested in court as technically weak and unreliable evidence.
- Reviews can disappear at any time: deletion by the author, removal by the platform after reporting, reviewer account deletion, retroactive text modification.
- Without a documented process of forensic acquisition with reviewer’s Profile ID, metadata, original timestamp and digital chain of custody, the irrefutable proof for legal action or removal is missing.
- Screenshots do not include essential technical elements to prove a review is fake: reviewer history, suspicious patterns, geolocation, hidden metadata.
Certifiable Review Platforms
⭐ Google Reviews Certification
Google My Business reviews are crucial for the local reputation of businesses, professionals, restaurants, hotels. We certify:
- Complete review with text, star rating, publication date;
- Google Profile ID of the reviewer (permanent unique identifier);
- Reviewer’s name and profile photo;
- Reviewer’s public review history (demonstrates fake patterns);
- Business response to the review (if present);
- Original publication timestamp;
- Complete context: Google My Business listing, other visible reviews.
Typical use cases: restaurants victimized by fake reviews from competitors, professionals defamed by never-existent clients, businesses hit by coordinated defamation campaigns, extortion reviews (“pay or I leave 1 star”).
🏨 TripAdvisor Certification
For hotels, B&Bs, restaurants, tourist attractions. We certify:
- Complete review with text, bubble rating, title;
- TripAdvisor Profile ID of the author;
- Reviewer profile: name, photo, badges (Contributor level), total number of reviews;
- Declared stay/visit date (if indicated);
- Photos attached to the review (when present);
- Owner’s response;
- Metadata: “Helpful votes”, “Review collected in partnership with…”.
Typical use cases: hotels damaged by fake reviews written by competitors, restaurants with extortion reviews, B&Bs victimized by revenge reviews from never-hosted guests.
🛡️ Trustpilot Certification
For e-commerce, online services, companies. We certify:
- Review with text, stars, title;
- Trustpilot Profile ID of the reviewer;
- Complete reviewer profile: name, number of reviews written, “Verified” badge;
- Experience date (if declared);
- “Verified Purchase” or “Invited Review” badge;
- Company response;
- Any updates/modifications to the review over time.
Typical use cases: e-commerce damaged by fake reviews from competitors, companies hit by organized defamation campaigns, extortion reviews from alleged customers.
📍 Yelp Certification
Important platform for USA and international markets. We certify:
- Complete review with text, stars, date;
- Yelp User ID unique;
- Reviewer profile: name, photo, Elite status, Friends, number of reviews;
- Check-in location (if present);
- Attached photos;
- “First to Review” badge;
- Business owner response.
Typical use cases: USA/Canada restaurants with fake reviews, small businesses damaged by competitor reviews, professionals hit by defamation.
📦 Amazon Reviews Certification
For sellers and brands on Amazon. We certify:
- Complete product review with text, stars, title;
- Amazon Customer ID (when visible);
- Reviewer name, “Verified Purchase” badge;
- Review date;
- Attached photos/videos;
- “Vine Voice” or “Top Reviewer” badge;
- Helpful votes (X people found this helpful);
- Link to reviewed product (ASIN).
Typical use cases: brands damaged by fake reviews from competitors, sellers hit by coordinated revenge reviews, products sabotaged with massive 1-star reviews.
👍 Facebook Reviews Certification
For Facebook business pages. We certify:
- Review/recommendation with text and stars;
- Facebook Profile ID of the reviewer;
- Reviewer profile: name, photo, mutual friends (when visible);
- Publication date;
- Business page response;
- Complete screenshot inserted in Facebook page context.
🍽️ Other Certifiable Platforms
- Booking.com: hotel/apartment reviews;
- TheFork (OpenTable): restaurant reviews;
- Airbnb: host and guest reviews;
- Glassdoor: employer reviews;
- Indeed: company reviews;
- Yellow Pages: professional reviews;
- Proprietary e-commerce sites: product reviews on any platform.
Request a Quote
We will immediately provide the technical modality, execution timeframes, and detailed cost estimate for fake review certification. Rapid intervention available for urgent cases.
Technical Analysis to Prove a Review Is Fake
🔍 Profile ID and Reviewer History Verification
The reviewer’s unique Profile ID is the key element for:
- Tracking permanent identity: even if the reviewer changes name/photo, the Profile ID remains unchanged;
- Analyzing review history: how many reviews have they written? Are they all negative? All written in the same period?
- Identifying fake patterns:
- Account created a few days ago and immediately negative review;
- Single review written = highly suspicious;
- Multiple negative reviews to competitors in the same sector;
- 5-10 negative reviews published all on the same day (coordinated attack);
- Linking multiple profiles: discovering if multiple fake accounts are managed by the same person.
🌍 IP Geolocation and Metadata Analysis
Technical metadata analysis enables identification of:
- Suspicious geolocation: reviewer writing from a different country than where the business is located (e.g., NYC restaurant review written from IP in Romania);
- VPN/Proxy usage: reviewer masking their identity to leave anonymous review;
- Abnormal timestamps: reviews written at implausible times (3-4 AM) from multiple accounts = bot/automatic script;
- Temporal patterns: 10 negative reviews received all on the same day = coordinated attack.
📝 Linguistic Analysis and Content
Analysis of the review text can reveal:
- Copied text/template: identical or very similar reviews left at multiple businesses;
- Stereotyped language: generic phrases not describing specific real experience;
- Factual inconsistencies: reviewer describes services/products the business doesn’t offer;
- Absence of specific details: generic review without elements showing real experience;
- Extortion tone: “if you don’t compensate me I’ll modify the review for worse”.
🔗 “Verified Purchase” Verification and Authenticity
For e-commerce platforms (Amazon, Trustpilot):
- Missing “Verified Purchase” badge: reviewer never purchased the product;
- Transactional data comparison: verify if the reviewer appears in actual customer databases;
- Review bombing: dozens of negative reviews at the same time from unverified accounts;
- Competitor review: reviewer leaving only positive reviews to competitors and negative to you.
European Legal Framework: eIDAS, CoE Guidelines, and Evidentiary Admissibility
To make defamatory review evidence solid and opposable at the European and international level, we rely on the main regulatory and technical references:
- eIDAS Regulation (EU) No. 910/2014: the qualified time stamp is essential when the reviewer claims “I never wrote that review” or “I already deleted it”.
- Council of Europe Guidelines on Electronic Evidence (January 30, 2019): forensically certified online reviews are fully admissible electronic evidence.
- e-Commerce Directive 2000/31/EC: platform liability for unlawful content and removal obligation upon well-founded notice.
- Cryptographic Integrity (SHA-256 hash): digital fingerprint of the complete review for mathematical integrity verifications.
- FEDIS Declaration: The FEDIS makes the certification admissible in courts of the EU, USA, UK, Canada, Australia.
Case Law and Recognition
⚖️ European Level
The Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) has established that digital evidence of defamatory reviews acquired with forensic methodologies is fully admissible.
The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has confirmed that online reviews can constitute public defamation and that platforms have obligations to remove manifestly unlawful content.
🌍 International Standards
- ISO/IEC 27037:2012 – guidelines for preservation of digital evidence;
- ISO/IEC 27050 – e-discovery standard;
- RFC 3161 and ETSI EN 319 422 – standards for time stamping;
- ETSI TS 101 903 (XAdES) – XML Advanced Electronic Signature.
Operational Modalities: Review Certification
Certification Process
- Review identification: the client provides exact URL of the defamatory/fake review and description of harm suffered;
- Complete forensic acquisition:
- Complete review with text, stars, date;
- Reviewer’s Profile ID (key technical element);
- Complete reviewer profile with public review history;
- Context: complete business page, other visible reviews;
- Multiple screenshots (desktop + mobile) high resolution;
- HTML source code of the page;
- Original publication timestamp;
- Fake pattern analysis (upon request): analysis of reviewer history to demonstrate suspicious patterns (new account, only negative reviews, abnormal timing);
- Profile investigation (optional): in-depth research on reviewer identity to provide useful elements for attorney;
- Modification monitoring (optional): multiple certifications over time to document if the review is modified or deleted after initial acquisition.
What You Receive After Certification: The “Lawyer-Ready” Evidentiary Package
- Certified PDF Report with:
- High-resolution screenshots of complete review;
- Reviewer’s Profile ID (permanent identifier);
- Reviewer profile with public review history;
- Complete URL, date/time of acquisition, platform;
- Complete context (business page, other reviews);
- HTML Source Code of the review page;
- Fake Pattern Analysis (if requested): document with technical evidence demonstrating fraudulent nature (new account, single review, suspicious timing, etc.);
- Reviewer History: complete list of public reviews written by author with pattern analysis;
- Cryptographic Fingerprints (SHA-256 hash) of the complete package as provided by the FEDIS protocol;
- Qualified Time Stamp compliant with eIDAS/RFC 3161;
- Forensic Technical Report: methodology applied, chain of custody, technical analyses;
- Investigation Report (optional): research on reviewer identity, links to competitors, other profiles;
- eIDAS Qualified Electronic Signature + jurisdiction-specific signature upon request.
- Certified PDF Report with:
GDPR Compliance and Personal Data Protection
Reviews contain personal data of the reviewer. We manage everything in full compliance with GDPR (EU 2016/679), applying data minimization, purpose limitation (documented evidentiary purposes for rights protection), technical security, access traceability, and limited retention.
The acquisition of publicly accessible reviews to document defamation/unlawful content constitutes a legitimate interest (Art. 6, par. 1, let. f GDPR) for defense of one’s rights in court. Upon request, redaction of non-essential reviewer data for court filing (while maintaining Profile ID for traceability).
When to Activate Review Certification
- if you receive a fake defamatory review on Google/TripAdvisor/Trustpilot damaging your reputation;
- if you are a victim of extortion reviews (“pay or I leave 1 star”, “withdraw the complaint or I’ll worsen the review”);
- if you suffer a coordinated attack (10-20 negative reviews all on the same day) from suspicious profiles;
- if an unfair competitor writes false negative reviews to damage you commercially;
- if you need to request removal from Google/platform with irrefutable forensic evidence;
- if you need to file a complaint for defamation with solid evidence;
- if you need to claim damages by demonstrating the economic/reputational harm suffered;
- if the fake review concerns events that never happened (customer you never had, service never provided);
- if you operate in international contexts and need evidence compliant with European/extra-European standards;
- if the review is at risk of imminent deletion/modification and you need to crystallize evidence immediately.
Request a Quote
We will immediately provide the optimal technical modality, execution timeframes, and detailed cost estimate for review certification. Urgent intervention available for cases with risk of review deletion. Discounts for multiple certification of several reviews.
Technical Note: Review certification is performed on publicly accessible content. The reviewer’s Profile ID is acquirable for most platforms. Fake pattern analysis requires that the reviewer profile has publicly visible review history. For Google Reviews, TripAdvisor, Trustpilot, acquisition is always complete. During the quote phase, we precisely indicate what is technically acquirable, any platform limitations, and available options (in-depth profile investigation, monitoring of modifications over time).
