Dubious distinction: Vietnam ranks 2nd in paid reviews on Tripadvisor

By Hoang Vu May 28, 2025 | 07:19 pm PT

Foreign tourists pose on Golden Bridge in Da Nang City. Photo by Hoang Duong

Indonesia has the highest rate of "paid reviews" on U.S. travel platform Tripadvisor at 20%, followed by Vietnam (14.1%) and the U.S. (8.9%), according to a recent report.

The top 10 is rounded off by Italy, the U.K., Pakistan, Egypt, India, Russia, and the Netherlands, according to Tripadvisor Transparency Report 2025.

Tripadvisor has four categories of fake submissions, boosting, vandalism, member fraud, and paid reviews, Becky Foley, vice president and head of trust and safety at the website, explained.

The report said the site processed 31 million reviews from 21 million members in 2024 and managed to block or remove 2.7 million fraudulent reviews, 4.8% of which were "paid reviews".

The 8% rate of fake reviews as more than double the rate in 2022, it said.

In 2024 Tripadvisor also removed over 200,000 reviews suspected to have been generated by AI.

Founded in 2000, Tripadvisor is one of the world's largest online travel review platforms, featuring hundreds of millions of reviews of hotels, restaurants, attractions, and travel services from users worldwide.