This AI unmasks fake shops on the Internet

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Anyone who orders goods on the Internet always takes a certain risk. Do the goods arrive on time? Or will it ever come?

Blick reader Fabian Misteli recently placed an order from the online store E-commerce-welt.ch, as Blick previously reported. At the beginning of March, he transferred the amount to be purchased in advance. Nothing has come so far. The online store first mentioned delivery problems, then no one could be reached. But things started to change when Blick intervened. Misteli was finally able to cancel her order and should get her money back.

million dollar damage

Many are like Misteli. Because E-commerce-welt.ch is a fake online store. There are more and more of them and they are getting harder and harder to spot. In Germany, the problem has reached such dimensions that the North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) consumer advice center has taken action. And with the new “Fake Store Locator” as reported by “die Bild”.

This is an AI application that should recognize fake stores. To do this, artificial intelligence checks the technical characteristics of online stores. For example: Does the URL look reliable? Is there a trace? What are customer ratings?

Because it’s an AI, the tool also learns. 120,000 domain names are currently listed, of which 27,000 are clearly identified as fake shops.

Finder works like a traffic light

If you feed the AI ​​with the URL of an online store, it works like a traffic light: if it’s green everything is fine, if it’s orange, caution is advised. If it’s red, you probably prefer to take your fingers off the mouse button and order from somewhere else.

In testing with the online store E-commerce-welt.ch, the traffic light of the fake store locator glows solid red: “This store URL shows signs of a fake store.” That speaks for the consumer center’s tool. Although the website has a print, the rating is poor with 2.1. The website is hosted by Shopify. This shop system builder includes several fake shops in addition to legit online shops.

Since 2020 in Austria there is an artificial intelligence that detects fake shops: fake shop detector. Such a program does not seem to be a problem in Switzerland.

Source :Blick