Bezos may have to appear in court for allegedly stealing third-party data and perjury!

Recently, the U.S. House Judiciary Committee asked Amazon founder and CEO Bezos to testify regarding Amazon employees' use of third-party sellers' data to develop their own brands.

Recently, Amazon responded that it would select appropriate candidates to testify on the use of third-party sellers' data, but Amazon did not mention the specific candidates.

You know, the last time Amazon was investigated for antitrust issues due to third-party seller data was in the middle of last year. Why is it digging up the old issues now and even calling on Bezos to testify in Congress?

In fact, although this incident is still a data issue for third-party sellers, it is no longer completely a bygone era.

In July 2019, the U.S. House Judiciary Committee's Antitrust Subcommittee questioned Amazon's collection of third-party seller data.

Amazon responded that the receipts it collects are only used to predict the products customers want to buy to help third-party sellers succeed. Moreover, Amazon's e-commerce business is very dependent on third-party sellers, so it will not compete with them through seller data.

However, relying on third-party sellers does not seem to guarantee that the platform will not develop its own brands to compete with sellers. This is also the focus of Amazon's third-party seller data issues.

Even though the fuse that triggered this incident, the Wall Street Journal reported in April this year that Amazon used huge third-party seller data to develop its own new products, its focus is still on Amazon's own brands.

In the report, the Wall Street Journal said that after an investigation, it was found that some Amazon executives had access to seller data and then used the data to find best-selling products that they might want to compete with.

The executives also developed workarounds for Amazon’s internal restrictions to obtain reports on individual seller data, part of a practice known as “fence climbing.”

It was this report that once again aroused the attention of users, sellers and the government to the data issues of Amazon's third-party sellers.

Earlier this month, the Judiciary Committee sent a letter to Amazon stating that if the report is true, then the testimony of Amazon executives in July last year is likely to be perjury or misleading testimony.

Amazon responded that it was prepared to send appropriate Amazon executives to testify to the committee, but strongly disagreed with any claim that Amazon attempted to mislead the committee or failed to cooperate with the investigation.

In addition to whether Amazon executives committed perjury, the core "private brand" of this incident was also constantly brought up.

Since the launch of its first private label "Amazon Basics" in 2008, the number of Amazon's private labels has reached 138 as of November 2019. With the surge in the number of private labels, merchants are becoming increasingly anxious.

Merchants believe that Amazon has an unfair advantage in competing with them. Amazon also once opened a special preferred module for its own brands on the search results page, giving it a natural competitive advantage in search position, traffic inclination, and ranking.

Fortunately, in January this year, Amazon adjusted its search results page and the above-mentioned preferred module was cancelled. The private label brand, once the pride of the day, also fell from grace.

However, even so, Amazon still needs to deal seriously with this third-party seller data storm.

On the one hand, for merchants, does Amazon really use seller data to develop its own brand products? For Congress, was the testimony given by Amazon executives last July perjury?

If Amazon did not commit perjury, it can respond generously. If it did commit perjury, it may not be too late to make amends. (This article is quoted from E-commerce News)

(Source: Cross-border K Circle)