Amazon · FTC · U.S. · Engadget
Amazon is sued by the FTC and 22 states for 'secretly' overcharging advertisers since 2019
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The company's "deception continues to this day," the lawsuit says.
Key facts
- Amazon has been sued by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and 22 states over its handling of advertising auctions
- The "scheme has likely illegally extracted over 20 billion dollars from its unwitting advertising customers," the lawsuit alleges
- After reviewing approximately 1.5 million pages spanning six years, the FTC leans on a handful of simplified communications to allege a companywide effort to deceive," the company writes
- The FTC says that overcharging advertisers ultimately led to higher prices on the platform, which hurt American consumers
Summary
Amazon has been sued by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and 22 states over its handling of advertising auctions. The regulator alleges that Amazon for years deceived its advertisers by adding "hidden" surcharges to its ad auctions, which resulted in ad buyers unknowingly overpaying for sponsored product placements and other ads on Amazon's platform. "Amazon has been able to successfully impose hidden surcharges on advertisers almost every time a shopper clicks on an advertisement on the Amazon website," the lawsuit states. Some details from the lawsuit have been redacted, but it quotes from several internal documents in which Amazon employees would seem to question the company's handling of auction pricing.