The New York Times reported that TripAdvisor, the large hotel and travel booking reviews site, was fined by the Italian Competition Authority for not preventing fake negative reviews on the site.

The fine was about $610,000 and they have 90-days to comply with the ruling.

TripAdvisor is an American company and this is the first time such a ruling has happened at this scale in regards to reviews either in the US or EU.

NY Times said:

TripAdvisor said “we think the ruling is unreasonable,” adding “we fight fraud aggressively and are very confident in the systems and processes we have in place.”

Their stock doesn’t seem all that impacted by this ruling.

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.