Google Deploys Gemini AI to Retroactively Detect and Remove Fake Reviews
What happened
Google is now using its Gemini AI model to detect fake reviews — not just at the point of posting, but retroactively across existing reviews. Reviews that looked legitimate months ago can now be flagged, removed, and trigger profile restrictions.
The system works at scale. In 2025 alone, Google blocked or removed 292 million policy-violating reviews. With Gemini, the detection is more sophisticated: the AI can identify suspicious patterns like sudden spikes in five-star reviews, coordinated posting from similar devices or locations, and inconsistent business category changes.
When Google detects a burst of spam reviews on a profile, it takes three immediate actions: removes the fake content, pauses all new reviews on the profile temporarily, and notifies the business owner. Google has also started displaying alert banners to consumers when suspicious reviews have recently been removed from a profile — visible to anyone searching for that business.
What this means for tradespeople
This is overwhelmingly good news for tradespeople who collect reviews honestly. The competitors who've been buying 50 five-star reviews from a review farm are now at serious risk of having their profiles flagged, reviews stripped, and an embarrassing "suspicious reviews removed" banner shown to potential customers.
For a self-employed plumber or electrician with 30 genuine reviews, this levels the playing field against businesses that have been gaming the system. Your real reviews from real customers are now worth more than ever — because the fake ones are being systematically removed from your competitors' profiles.
The one risk: if someone has been posting reviews from your own business premises (a shared tablet, for example), Google's GPS and device fingerprinting could flag those as suspicious even if they're genuine. Send review requests after the customer has left — via WhatsApp or SMS — to keep everything clean.
What to do about it
Keep collecting reviews the right way: after every completed job, send a personalised review request by WhatsApp or SMS. Genuine reviews from real devices at real customer locations are exactly what Google's AI is designed to reward.
If you notice a competitor with an implausibly high number of five-star reviews, keep an eye on their profile — Gemini may well be catching up with them.
Source: Partoo