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Amazon Commits to Tougher Measures Against Fake Reviews After UK Investigation

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Amazon has agreed to implement stronger actions to combat fake reviews on its platform, following a four-year investigation by the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA). The deal includes new enforcement powers that allow Amazon to sanction British businesses found using deceptive tactics to boost product ratings, as well as measures to detect and remove fraudulent content more efficiently.

The CMA said on Friday that Amazon’s commitments also address concerns about “catalogue abuse” — a practice where sellers attach their products to highly rated but unrelated items in order to mislead shoppers and inflate rankings. In severe cases, businesses violating these rules could face bans from Amazon’s platform altogether. Individual users who post fake reviews may also be prohibited from submitting further reviews.

According to the CMA, approximately 90% of consumers rely on online reviews when making purchasing decisions, making the integrity of reviews crucial for fair competition and consumer trust. Amazon’s new obligations will include robust systems to identify and eliminate manipulated reviews and enforce stricter penalties for offenders.

The regulator began its investigation into Amazon and Google in 2021 over potential breaches of consumer protection law. In January, Google also made similar commitments to improve the reliability of online reviews. CMA chief executive Sarah Cardell praised Amazon’s actions, stating, “These new commitments matter and help set the standard.”

The CMA has recently been granted new enforcement powers allowing it to independently determine if consumer law has been broken. It can now issue fines and compel businesses to improve their practices without needing to go through lengthy court proceedings.

In parallel, the CMA is conducting a broad assessment of online review platforms as part of its ongoing work to ensure compliance with its newly updated reviews guidance issued in April.

Broadcom Raises Revenue Forecast on AI Chip Demand but Shares Dip

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Broadcom delivered a stronger-than-expected revenue forecast for its third quarter, supported by robust demand for its networking and custom AI computing chips. The company projected Q3 revenue of approximately $15.80 billion, exceeding analysts’ average estimate of $15.71 billion according to LSEG data.

Despite the upbeat forecast, Broadcom’s shares fell 4% in after-hours trading. The stock had already climbed nearly 30% over the past month and around 12% for the year, leading some investors to view the forecast as insufficiently exceeding high market expectations. “Clearly, expectations were high coming into the print,” said Kinngai Chan, senior research analyst at Summit Insights Group.

The Palo Alto-based company plays a crucial role in the AI hardware ecosystem, designing custom processors and networking chips for major AI and cloud computing clients such as OpenAI and Google. Broadcom has begun shipping its newest networking chip, the Tomahawk 6, which doubles the performance of its predecessor and enhances data center efficiency for AI workloads.

Broadcom CEO Hock Tan highlighted the ongoing growth, noting that AI semiconductor revenue is expected to accelerate to $5.1 billion in the third quarter, marking ten consecutive quarters of growth. “Our hyperscale partners continue to invest,” Tan stated. In contrast, non-AI semiconductor revenue remains sluggish and near the bottom of its cycle.

For the second quarter, Broadcom reported total revenue of $15 billion, narrowly surpassing analysts’ estimates of $14.99 billion. Revenue from its semiconductor segment, which includes products for data centers and networking, grew 16.7% year-over-year to $8.41 billion.

Reddit Sues AI Firm Anthropic for Alleged Unauthorized Use of Data

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Reddit has filed a lawsuit against artificial intelligence startup Anthropic, accusing it of illegally using Reddit’s content to train its AI models without permission or a licensing agreement. The suit was filed Wednesday in San Francisco Superior Court, marking the latest legal clash over AI companies’ use of third-party online content.

In the complaint, Reddit alleges that Anthropic has scraped and exploited data from the platform over 100,000 times, despite publicly claiming last year that it had blocked its bots from accessing Reddit. According to Reddit, Anthropic’s Claude chatbot even acknowledged it was trained on at least some Reddit data, but could not confirm whether deleted content had been included.

“Anthropic refuses to respect Reddit’s guardrails and enter into a license agreement,” the complaint says, contrasting the company’s stance with that of Google and OpenAI, both of which have entered licensing arrangements with Reddit.

Reddit claims Anthropic’s actions violate its user policies and have allowed the startup to enrich itself by “tens of billions of dollars.” The lawsuit seeks unspecified restitution, punitive damages, and an injunction to stop Anthropic from further using Reddit content for commercial purposes.

Anthropic Responds

An Anthropic spokesperson said the company disagrees with Reddit’s claims and intends to defend itself vigorously. The lawsuit adds further scrutiny to Anthropic, whose backers include tech giants Amazon and Alphabet (Google).

Anthropic recently launched its latest Claude models, Opus 4 and Sonnet 4, on May 22, and has reportedly reached $3 billion in annualized revenue, according to sources familiar with the matter.

Growing Legal Tensions Over AI Training Data

This legal dispute highlights a broader industry-wide debate over how AI companies source and utilize data to train large language models. Many websites and publishers argue that AI firms are profiting from content without compensating the creators, while AI companies contend that publicly available internet data falls under fair use.

In a statement, Reddit Chief Legal Officer Ben Lee emphasized the platform’s support for an open internet but said AI companies need “clear limitations” when it comes to scraping and monetizing content.

Both companies are headquartered in San Francisco, located just a few blocks apart.

The case has been filed under Reddit Inc v Anthropic PBC, California Superior Court, San Francisco County, No. CGC-25-524892.