Amazon Tricked Millions Into Signing Up For Prime Subscription, According To US FTC Lawsuit

Access to web series and original content and quicker deliveries are reason enough for many consumers to sign up for an Amazon Prime subscription. But there are still a lot of people who aren't inclined towards paying for premium services, which is their right as consumers.

But now Amazon faces accusations of tricking people into getting Prime subscriptions without their consent, and preventing them from opting out of the plan.

Accused of deception

The lawsuit against Amazon has been filed by the US Federal Trade Commission, which alleges that the e-commerce giant got millions on board the Prime bandwagon without their knowledge.

It did so by creating dark patterns with user interface termed as manipulative, coercive and deceptive by the FTC.

Since 2021, the trade body has been looking into the signing up and cancellation processes of Amazon Prime, which has 200 million subscribers worldwide so far.

How they pulled it off

The FTC discovered that the e-tailer deliberately made it difficult for people to buy certain items if they didn't have prime.

It further noticed that the platform didn't clearly show buyers that they were accepting a recurring Prime subscription during the process of completing their transaction.

It found that when people tried to cancel the subscription that was costing them money, they faced a barrage of different steps that would be even more frustrating.

The Amazon leadership also rejected or delayed the upgrades, which could speed up and simplify the process of cancelling subscriptions, according to the lawsuit.