Italy Imposes a $4.6 Million Penalty on Trustpilot Over Fake Reviews
In Focus
- Antitrust regulators started probing Trustpilot in July 2025
- The reviews platform failed to confirm the legitimacy of reviews posted on its website
- Investigation found that Trustpilot violated Italy’s consumer protection laws
Italy has fined Trustpilot and its subsidiary companies $4.6 million (€4 million), Yahoo Finance reported. Italy’s antitrust regulator penalized the online review platform for misleading consumers on how its services work. The watchdog also fined the reviews platform for failing to sufficiently verify the authenticity of reviews.
Regulators Commenced Probe in 2025
The Italian Competition and Market Authority (AGCM) started probing Trustpilot in July 2025. The investigation focused on the system that the customer reviews platform uses to organize as well as display company reviews and ratings. At the time, Italian antitrust regulators held that the system was not transparent enough and was likely to mislead consumers.
But Trustpilot argued that its ranking process was designed to identify the best companies as those that promote transparency and trust. However, preliminary findings by regulators showed that the platform did not provide clear and comprehensive information to consumers on how the platform works and its guidelines for ranking businesses.
Italian regulators imposed the €4 million penalty on Trustpilot months after Grizzly research alleged that the platform was generating fake profiles with negative reviews. The research firm also accused Trustpilot of pushing enterprises to pay a subscription fee. The online review platform denied these claims.
News about Trustpilot’s fake reviews come months after the Italian competition watchdog instructed Meta platforms to halt policy that prohibits competing AI chatbots from its WhatsApp platform. The order made WhatsApp accessible to Meta’s AI competitors.
The regulator had been probing Meta Platforms since July 2025 to determine whether the AI features introduced on WhatsApp abuse its dominant position.
Trustpilot Violated Consumer Protection Laws
Following the investigation, the Italian antitrust watchdog determined that Trustpilot violated consumer protection laws by failing to confirm the legitimacy of reviews posted on its website. Officials found that the platform’s review collection services allowed enterprises to decide which customers received invitations to post reviews.
According to the Italian Competition Authority, this move undermines the representativeness of published ratings, even when the platform labels reviews as verified. Additionally, investigations revealed that Trustpilot applied ‘dark patterns’ techniques on the design of its interface to conceal important information on how its platform functions.
Enterprises paid for their review services despite Trustpilot’s misleading consumer reviews, contrary to Italy’s consumer code.
What Does Italy’s Fine Mean for Digital Platforms?
Italy’s monetary fine on Trustpilot reflects the growing scrutiny of digital platforms by European regulators. Specifically, regulators are paying attention to transparency of business models and management of user-generated content. Last year, the EU penalized X $140 million for breaching transparency rules under the Digital Services Act.
Italian antitrust regulators also imposed a €98.6 million fine on Apple for allegedly abusing its dominance in the mobile app distribution market. The antitrust fine followed a probe into the tech company’s privacy policy.
It was a culmination of a probe into Apple’s App Tracking Transparency (ATT) privacy policy, which the company introduced in April 2021. Trustpilot shares dropped 2.5% in early trading following the €4 million fine.
