Larry Cermak, head of analysis at The Block, said he is concerned that sponsored reviews delivered by self-purported cryptocurrency gurus are driving new investors to make poor decisions. “The main reason why so many inexperienced individuals invest in bad crypto projects is because they listen to advice from a so-called expert,” he complained. Many unskilled investors “believe they can take this advice at face value even though it is often fraudulent, intentionally misleading or conflicted.”

In a recent interview with Reuters, Hacken’s Budorin said that sponsored video reviews should feature tags identifying them as such. He added that the company’s decision to pay for positive reviews was “unethical.”

Tim Glaus, co-founder of Swiss cryptocurrency ratings company Alethena, said the company has been approached by several individuals offering to arrange paid-for ratings from Icobench experts. Maxim Sharatsky, the chief executive officer of Icobench, acknowledged that the platform has accidentally published reviews that were sponsored by ICO issuers.

“We have more than 16,000 ratings on our platform. Unfortunately, we have (had) accidents with sales (of) ratings, and it’s very bad. It’s a problem for me, for our platform and for all interested,” Sharatsky said.

Sourced through Scoop.it from: news.bitcoin.com