I have been disappointed to find that many startup founders — even those who work in "impact" or "education" — do not care about the ethics or legality of paid reviews. I had a discussion with one founder a few years back, and at first I thought he was simply unaware of the then-new FTC guidelines. But it became clear that he did not care if what he was doing was illegal since "it's just the way business gets done", in his words. Caveat emptor!

There are also no consequences, so there’s no reason for a company to act morally/legally in our current economic system. I’ve never heard of a company paying fines for buying positive reviews.