Google has a lot of strikes against it, no doubts there, and this doesn't change that. Still, you got to give credit where credit is due:
Alphabet Inc.'s Google has removed hundreds of negative reviews for a tracker that identifies apparel brands linked to forced Uyghur labor after its creator said the reviews were part of a disinformation campaign.
The app in question, the Uyghur Forced Labor Checker, is put out by the Human Rights Foundation. It "alerts internet users if a retailer or business whose website they are visiting has links to forced Uyghur labor." If you're looking to avoid contracting with companies that facilitate the brutal enslavement and brainwashing of the Uyghur population of China, it's useful.
Yet the company earlier this year told Google it had been hit with "a barrage of one-star ratings," most of them seemingly bogus:
"Malicious slander."
"Leakage of privacy."
"Isn't it too boring."
Sounds like a big old astroturf to me! Now, Google might have ignored this request; they're a big tech company and doubtless have links to the Uyghur enslavement to varying degrees. But they stepped up here and stripped the reviews from the app. Good for them.
Bloomberg, meanwhile, isn't speculating on where this bomb campaign came from:
It wasn't clear who was behind the negative reviews.
Really? It's not clear?
I think we know.
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