Consumers Can't Trust Amazon

Counterfeits, fraud and scams flood Amazon's marketplace.

September 6, 2018 - Los Angeles, CA – Amazon wants consumers to believe that shopping on Amazon will be a trustworthy and honest experience, but it's not. While Amazon is profiting, consumers face an inexhaustible flood of counterfeit and replica products, fraudulent sellers, and scams.

Consumers might believe they can rely on Amazon to police the marketplace and weed out "bad actors," as Amazon so often claims, but that confidence is misplaced. Behind the scenes, reality is entirely different. It's clear that Amazon is not effective in its mission to cleanse its ecosystem of counterfeits, scams and fraud.

• Items sold and shipped directly from Amazon, Prime membership offerings, and the Fulfilled by Amazon (FBA) offerings are plagued with counterfeits.
• Trusted brands are being destroyed by Amazon and its third-party sellers who offer counterfeit, fake and replica products and books right alongside, and even in the same listings, as authentic items.
• Search results and product reviews are no indication of authenticity or quality, and may not even be related to the product searched. Worldwide scammers work to outsmart and trick Amazon's automated ranking systems with fake reviews and ratings, while some sellers pay off workers inside Amazon to gain competitive information reports the Wall Street Journal.
• Amazon's seller evaluations (feedback) and product ratings are virtually pointless. Negative reviews may be removed by Amazon, while sellers hire businesses to create dummy accounts, purchase products, and write fictitious reviews.
• Corporate ethics and responsiveness to right holders have deteriorated into automated replies, and confused responses from overseas and ill-trained Amazon "outsource" partners, or no response at all.
• Amazon uses a crafty excuse; "Your trademark must be in registered status in [each country the item is sold in]" to avoid removing counterfeits on some of its 14 global websites, yet the products can ship to anywhere in the world.
• With over 50% of U.S. e-commerce sales, Amazon has a massive penetration into the consumer market and is preventing customers from buying products from their competitors.

Amazon falls back its claim; "We stand behind the products sold on our site with our A-to-z Guarantee." That could be true, but only if consumers were informed by Amazon (or knew) they received a counterfeit product. However, Amazon does not notify consumers they received a fake, even after notification by the right holders.

Amazon recently required infringed right holders to contractually waive all rights to; submitted content, class action lawsuits, court trials, or even a response from Amazon, just to submit a counterfeit complaint to its Brand Registry program. Criticism continues for Amazon's obstructive and dysfunctional counterfeit reporting system, while counterfeits and dangerous items can remain for months.

With parallels to New York City’s notorious Canal Street or Santee Alley in Los Angeles, Amazon is an e-commerce haven for fraudulent sellers and unrestricted and poorly policed counterfeit items. While a fake plastic phone case may be OK with some consumers, an exploding Apple Charger, fake OTC drugs, or toxic cosmetics certainly would not be. Counterfeiting supports terrorism, organized crime and skirts taxes.

Through huge legal loopholes, and virtually immune to prosecution, IP laws and safety standards, Amazon continues to enable and facilitate criminal activity while profiting from counterfeit sales which destroy manufacturers, deceives consumers, and destroys jobs and public trust.

Congress can choose to act on shady e-commerce counterfeit practices, and consumers can shop elsewhere. Will they?