TripAdvisor under fire for 'real traveller' contribution claim The Advertising Standards Authority is concerned some reviews on the TripAdvisor website may be "non-genuine." Photograph: Christopher Furlong/Getty Images Advertising watchdogs have criticised the travel website TripAdvisor for asserting that all contributions on its pages were honest and from real travellers. The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) said it was possible that "non-genuine" reviews could be carried on the site. TripAdvisor bills itself as the largest travel community in the world with more than 50 million unique visitors every month and more than 60m reviews and opinions. But some hoteliers and others in the hospitality trade claim the site is open to abuse, for example from rivals keen to attack an establishment's reputation. Two hotels and a company called KwikChex, which specialises in online reputation management, challenged a claim on the TripAdvisor site that it "offers trusted advice from real travellers" and featured "honest travel reviews and opinions." They argued the claims were misleading and could be substantiated because TripAdvisor could not verify all the reviews on its sites and therefore could not prove all were genuine and from real travellers. The ASA concluded that TripAdvisor did seem to be suggesting it "could be certain the reviews posted were from genuine travellers, and accurately reflected those travellers' experiences of the places they visited." It said: "We understood that reviews could be placed on the site without any form of verification, and that whilst TripAdvisor took steps to monitor and deal with suspicious activity, it was possible that non-genuine content would appear on the site undetected." The ASA added: "We did not consider that consumers would necessarily be able to detect and separate non-genuine reviews from genuine content, particularly where a hotel or other establishment had not received many reviews, and nor did we consider that a hotelier's response in itself would go far enough to alert consumers to, and moderate, non-genuine content." It concluded the claim was misleading and has told TripAdvisor it should not appear again it that form. A TripAdvisor spokesman said: "The ASA has taken a highly technical view around some marketing copy that was used in a limited capacity. We have confidence that the 50 million users who come to our site every month trust the reviews they read on TripAdvisor, which is why they keep coming back to us in increasingly larger numbers to plan and have the perfect trip. The average traveller reads dozens of reviews before making an informed decision, not just one or two. We know that our users approach TripAdvisor with common sense, and make an educated decision based on the opinions of many. If people did not feel the insight they gained from our site was an accurate reflection of their experience they wouldn't keep coming back. KwikChex claimed malevolent reviews did great harm to reputable businesses. A spokesman said: "It is small businesses that suffer most, as they tend to have few reviews and so the impact is much greater." The spokesman claimed a growing number of people were using reviews sites to extort discounts and money from businesses.