I'm an editor at a journal, and these fake review cases have one thing in common, which is that the journal is using author suggestions for reviewers to solicit reviews.

For those unfamiliar with the practice, this is common, and seems to becoming more standard at many journals, even (especially?) very reputable ones.

I almost always ignore the reviewer's requests for particular authors, because it always seems to involve a conflict of interest. I am sensitive to requests for a particular author not to review a paper, because of vindictiveness in academics, but requesting reviewers is a different story.

I've seen significant changes in this practice over time. Originally it seemed unusual, almost an option of last resort to cue the editor to bitter feuds or to help identify reviewers in areas that involve highly idiosyncratic issues. At a lot of journals this is still the case. Over time, though, it's seemed to turn into something different, a stopgap measure for overburdened, unconscientious, or harried editors to find increasingly scarce reviewers.

A lot of attention has been paid to the pressures on researchers to publish or perish, quality be damned, and how that affects science. The flip side of that coin, though, is changes in editorial practices at many journals, which have become very cursory, rubber-stamping affairs. Turnaround time on papers is very quick at many journals, which gives authors quick feedback, but at the same time (not necessarily as a result) the review process has become shoddy. Editors are often unfamiliar with the subject material and don't take time to learn it, will grasp at reviewers who might be unqualified or have conflicts of interest, and treat reviews very superficially, even though studies have shown that they are horribly unreliable. To be fair, even finding reviewers can be difficult: I've had conversations with colleagues who have been told not to review because it doesn't bring in revenue to the department. Everyone wants to publish, but not everyone wants to review.

Things are broken in science at the moment, at least in academics. Publishing through peer review has become extremely overvalued. I think it will maintain its place for certain reasons, but some change in mindset or culture around it is necessary.