Reuters: Amazon Copied Products and Rigged Search Results, Documents Show ⇥ reuters.com

Aditya Kalra and Steve Stecklow, Reuters:

In sworn testimony before the U.S. Congress in 2020, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos explained that the e-commerce giant prohibits its employees from using the data on individual sellers to help its private-label business. And, in 2019, another Amazon executive testified that the company does not use such data to create its own private-label products or alter its search results to favor them.

But the internal documents seen by Reuters show for the first time that, at least in India, manipulating search results to favor Amazon’s own products, as well as copying other sellers’ goods, were part of a formal, clandestine strategy at Amazon – and that high-level executives were told about it. The documents show that two executives reviewed the India strategy – senior vice presidents Diego Piacentini, who has since left the company, and Russell Grandinetti, who currently runs Amazon’s international consumer business.

Earlier this year, Mother Jones cited several journalists who, in the words of one, claimed that Amazon is “the only company [they have] dealt with that has directly lied to me”. Several reporters used that word, “lie”, or said the company was deceitful in its responses to journalists — that it goes far beyond a typical carefully worded corporate message.

It would make sense if that reputation carried through to its dealings with lawmakers. World leaders are mostly deferential to executive wrongdoing. What consequences would be faced by Jeff Bezos or any of the managers named in this article if these allegations were proven true, if only for their false public statements?