Amazon trial begins on FTC claims it duped Prime subscribers

24/9/2025 12:22

Amazon knew millions of customers were unintentionally signing up for Prime membership but did not stop them because doing so would have hurt its revenue, U.S. Federal Trade Commission attorneys argued Tuesday at the start of an anti-trust case.



The civil case against Amazon and three of its executives is a key test of the FTC's tough-on-tech stance and could force the company to pay damages worth hundreds of millions of dollars, plus fines of up to $53,000 per violation. It could also mar the image of a company that describes itself as obsessed with making customers' lives easier.



Amazon knew how to simplify the Prime membership sign-up and cancellation processes but opted not to, "because to Amazon, nothing about Prime matters more than the number of members, whether those members want to be members or not," FTC attorney Jonathan Cohen told jurors during opening statements.

"More members, more money," he repeated several times while laying out the government's case in the federal courthouse a short walk from the Seattle-based company's headquarters.