House approves bill protecting online customer reviews

The U.S. House on Monday night approved a bill that protects consumers from businesses who want to punish them for writing negative online reviews on sites like Yelp.

The Consumer Review Fairness Act bans clauses in contracts that penalize customers for writing online reviews or ban the practice outright. It passed the full House by voice vote.

{mosads}A similar piece of legislation has already passed the Senate. Supporters of the bills include review sites like Yelp and TripAdvisor, as well as major public interest groups.

“The protection of free speech and expression, both online and off, should be a top priority of our government, and all Americans,” Yelp lobbyist Laurent Crenshaw said in a statement. “With a similar bill having already passed the Senate, it is our hope that gag clauses will soon be explicitly prohibited across America by the end of the year.”

Lawmakers also approved by voice vote the Better Online Ticket Sales Act, which bans the use of so-called “bots” that purchase a large swath of tickets to live events that can later be resold at a higher price. It also prohibits selling that software or peddling tickets that the seller knows have been purchased using a bot.

Many involved in staging live events have called for a ban on bots.

“You shouldn’t have to fight robots just to see something you love,” Lin-Manuel Miranda, the creator of the musical “Hamilton,” wrote in a June op-ed about anti-bot legislation in New York.

The bill’s passage also comes before a Senate Commerce Committee subcommittee hearing on related legislation in the Upper Chamber. Witnesses include the producer of “Hamilton,” as well as lawyers for StubHub and Pandora and a representative of the Big 12 athletic conference.