The United States has accused Amazon of duping customers into signing up for automatically renewing Prime subscriptions and making cancellation difficult.
The charges were made in a lawsuit by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), the country’s consumer rights agency.
More than 200 million people worldwide subscribe to Amazon Prime, a subscription service that provides delivery benefits, access to streaming movies, and other benefits.
Amazon did not respond right away.
“Amazon tricked and trapped people into recurring subscriptions without their consent, not only frustrating users but also costing them significant money,” FTC Chair Lina Khan said announcing the suit, which was filed in federal court in Seattle.
According to the FTC, Amazon employed website designs that pushed customers to agree to enroll in Prime and have their subscription automatically renew as they made purchases.
According to the FTC, Amazon attempted to make opting out of auto-enrolment difficult because “those changes would also negatively affect Amazon’s bottom line.”
The company also allegedly subjected consumers who wanted to cancel to a time-consuming “four-page, six-click, fifteen option” process, which the FTC said was internally dubbed “Iliad” in reference to the Greek classic about the “long, arduous Trojan War.”
According to the FTC, the company’s methods violated consumer protection rules.
Amazon altered the cancellation process shortly before the lawsuit was filed, the agency added.
It is seeking a court order to force Amazon to change its practices, as well as financial penalties in an unspecified amount.
Prime costs $139 a year or $14.99 monthly in the US and £95 per year in the UK.
About 70% of subscribers are based in the US, according to the FTC.
The FTC has repeatedly warned online firms against using “dark patterns” to manipulate shoppers.
It had been investigating Amazon’s Prime programme since 2021.
It said the company had attempted to delay the probe on multiple occasions, including by refusing to deliver documents in a timely manner.
The lawsuit marks the third action from the FTC involving Amazon in recent weeks.
The company agreed to pay $25m last month to settle charges it had violated child privacy laws by keeping recordings children made on Alexa.
It agreed to pay another $5.8m to resolve claims that Ring, the doorbell company
Amazon, purchased in 2018, had violated privacy protections by giving staff unrestricted access to customer videos and failing to implement precautions against hackers.
