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posted by takyon on Monday November 06 2017, @05:01AM   Printer-friendly
from the southwestworld dept.

At various resorts in Mexico, multiple tourists have claimed to have been sexually assaulted, served spiked drinks that caused blackouts, or that the resorts refused to call police. However, TripAdvisor has been removing negative reviews written by these people:

Since July, when the Journal Sentinel began investigating the mysterious death of a Wisconsin college student in Mexico — and found widespread problems with tainted alcohol, derelict law enforcement and price gouging from hospitals — more than a dozen travelers from across the country have said TripAdvisor muzzled their first-hand stories of blackouts, rapes and other ways they were injured while vacationing in Mexico.

[...] The company's policies and practices obscure the public's ability to fully evaluate the information on its site. Secret algorithms determine which hotels and resorts appear when consumers search. Some hotels pay TripAdvisor when travelers click on their links; some pay commissions when tourists book or travel.

An untold number of TripAdvisor users have been granted special privileges, including the ability to delete forum posts. But the company won't disclose how those users are selected.

takyon: The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel broke the story (broader investigation here). TripAdvisor has apologized for at least one forum post removal and has restored a deleted account of rape at an Iberostar resort in Riviera Maya, Mexico. They evidently had no difficulty in restoring a deleted forum post written in 2010.


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  • (Score: 2) by Lester on Monday November 06 2017, @08:42AM (3 children)

    by Lester (6231) on Monday November 06 2017, @08:42AM (#592934) Journal

    The problem is that those are very serious accusations. If they are false (or can't be demonstrated), Tripadvisor may run into serious legal troubles.

    Tripadvisor is a reviews site, not press that has to investigate what is published. So, to be in the safe place, this kind of accusations are deleted.

    The advantage of anonymity in Internet is that you can denounce with safety. The problem with anonymity in Internet is that everybody can defame with impunity. Public review sites don't think that it is its business to solve that dilemma.

    Starting Score:    1  point
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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 06 2017, @09:09AM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 06 2017, @09:09AM (#592940)

    Logical

    It's logical: those rapes were meant to be a feature.

    • (Score: 2) by Lester on Monday November 06 2017, @11:36AM (1 child)

      by Lester (6231) on Monday November 06 2017, @11:36AM (#592984) Journal

      Did those rapes really happen or was just an angry customer?

      TripAdvisor is not going to investigate it. Are you?

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 06 2017, @12:23PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday November 06 2017, @12:23PM (#593005)

        Did those rapes really happen or was just an angry customer?
        TripAdvisor is not going to investigate it. Are you?

        I just finished the investigation.
        It was an angry customer, knocked-out by a rape drug and denied the experience of the legitimate rape that was advertised to her.