Amazon’s use of marketplace data breaks competition law, EU charges
Amazon’s use of marketplace data breaks competition law, EU charges

                      
                      
          Europe's top competition regulator filed charges today against Amazon, alleging that the company has abused its size, position, and access to data to gain an unfair advantage over the competition.
The European Commission's statement of objections against Amazon is centered on the firm's "dual role" in e-commerce, where it is both a retailer and also a platform for third-party retailers. As a platform, Amazon has access to proprietary data about all those other merchants' online business, which it then gathers and uses anticompetitively to get a leg up in its own retail operations, the EU alleges.
This is not just an infrequent or occasional lapse, the EC determined, finding instead that "very large quantities of non-public seller data" are available to Amazon and "flow directly into [Amazon's] automated systems." Amazon then allegedly uses that data to make its own determinations, "to the detriment of the other marketplace sellers." 
The Wall Street Journal reported earlier this year that Amazon employees in the US were accessing and using that data—even though an Amazon executive told Congress to their faces in a hearing that the company does no such thing.
"We knew we shouldn’t," access that data, one former Amazon employee told the WSJ. "But at the same time, we are making Amazon branded products, and we want them to sell."
"We must ensure that dual role platforms with market power, such as Amazon, do not distort competition," said Margrethe Vestager, head of the EU's competition bureau. "Data on the activity of third-party sellers should not be used to the benefit of Amazon when it acts as a competitor to these sellers. The conditions of competition on the Amazon platform must also be fair. Its rules should not artificially favor Amazon's own retail offers or advantage the offers of retailers using Amazon's logistics and delivery services."
The Commission also announced that it has begun a second antitrust probe into Amazon's business. The new investigation will determine whether the factors that go into amazon's "buy box," and its leverage of "Fulfilled By Amazon" logistics and delivery services, add up to unlawful abuse of a dominant market position.

          
                      
                  