Unfair commercial practices, spam, and fake online reviews. The Italian perspective and comparative profiles

Abstract

This paper starts its analysis from Legislative Decree number 146/2007 which incorporated Directive 2005/29/EC into the Italian Consumer Code. This Directive is about unfair commercial practices, useful in illustrating the phenomenon undertaken by unscrupulous businessmen against consumers. Ten years after the enforcement and entry of this legislation into Italian law, the balance is still not positive because consumers do not seem to be totally protected from the implementation of those devious entrepreneurial strategies designed to mislead the consumer from taking an informed decision of a commercial nature. More specifically, in my study I analyze the lack of legislation, above all on unfair trade practices classified as spam and fake reviews (otherwise known as ‘opinion spam’) against which Italian private law (different from other legal systems) is totally insufficient to protect consumers.