For years, consumers watered down their online criticism for fear of being sued. But a new study reveals that when the US government banned businesses from using legal threats to silence customers, internet reviews immediately became more negative, detailed, and authentic.
Published in the journal Information Systems Research, the study analysed more than two million hotel reviews on TripAdvisor to understand how legal pressure shapes the digital information people rely on every day.
Researchers examined the impact of the 2016 Consumer Review Fairness Act, a federal law that prohibited companies from using contract clauses or legal threats to stop customers from posting negative feedback.
A striking difference
By comparing US hotels with those in countries unaffected by the law, the researchers found a striking difference. After the legislation took effect, American hotel reviews saw a drop in star ratings, became more negative in tone, and grew significantly longer.
“That pattern is exactly what you would expect if people had been holding back before,” said researcher Aida Sanatizadeh. “When legal pressure lifts, authenticity rises”.
The shift in honesty was not evenly distributed. The most dramatic changes were seen in reviews for hotels with weaker reputations and those facing intense competition—suggesting these businesses had previously had the most to gain from suppressing bad reviews.
A “chilling effect”
However, the research also uncovered a lasting “chilling effect” among users who had previously faced legal action. Consumers who reported receiving legal threats were more likely to write more positive reviews systematically afterwards, not just for the business that threatened them, but across all platforms.
The findings, which were also replicated using Google Places data, provide rare empirical evidence that consumer protection laws can meaningfully change online behaviour and restore market transparency.
