Reputation Systems: Facilitating Trust in Internet Interactions

摘要: The Internet has created vast new opportunities to interact with strangers. interactions can be fun, informative, even profitable. But they also involve risks. Is the advice from a self-proclaimed expert at expertcentral.com reliable? Will an unknown dot-com site or eBay seller ship appropriate packaging, and will product as described? Before Internet, such questions were answered, in part, through reputations. Vendors provided references, Better Business Bureaus tallied complaints, past personal experience person-to-person gossip told you whom could rely upon not. And businessman’s standing community, e.g., his role church, served valuable hostage. services operate on vastly larger scale than Main Street permit virtually anonymous interactions. Nevertheless, reputation systems are playing major role. Systems emerging that respect anonymity Internet’s scale. A system collects, distributes, aggregates feedback about participants’ behavior. Though few of producers consumers ratings know each other, these help people decide trust, encourage trustworthy behavior, deter participation by those who unskilled dishonest. For example, consider eBay, largest online auction site, more 4 million auctions open time. offers no warranty for its auctions; it only serves listing service while buyers sellers assume all risks associated transactions. There fraudulent transactions sure. Nonetheless, overall rate successful remains astonishingly high market “ripe possibility largescale fraud deceit” is [ref. Kollock]. attributes system, Feedback Forum. After transaction completed, buyer have opportunity other (1, 0, -1) leave comments (“Good transaction. Nice person do business with! Would highly recommend.”). Each participant running total points attached visibly