This hijacked Amazon listing is going viral [Crew Review]

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Hey Reader,

“The Seller is a Motherf*cker”

You wouldn’t normally expect to see this combination of words on Amazon, but this is exactly what happened to a third-party seller’s listing.

Ailessom is a Brand Registered third-party seller that offers mixers on its Amazon store. One of its listings has been hijacked and edited to include a cuss word, and Amazon sellers aren’t really all that surprised.

The problem of listing hijacking has been a concern for third-party sellers on the platform for more than a decade. Because Amazon doesn’t want multiple listings for the same product, they have to “share” these listings, giving editing access to other sellers.

There are a couple of theories that may explain how the listing was hijacked. It might be an inside job, e.g., a disgruntled employee. It may also be caused by another seller who claims to be selling the same product.

The more concerning one, however, is that it may be caused by Amazon first-party sellers. These sellers have access to Vendor Central, which gives them more control over what they can upload as well as other listings when they claim they’re also selling the product.

Modern Retail interviewed Riverbed Consulting Co-founder Lesley Hensell, who said that there are people who buy dormant first-party Amazon accounts and offer illegal services to sellers who want to sabotage their competition.

This has been a concern for years, but it seems like Amazon has not come up with a solution to the issue.

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$1.2 Billion Against Counterfeits

You don’t need to spend thousands of dollars on a luxury bag if you’re willing to settle for something that looks a lot like the original. (Although there’s a good chance you’ll end up with a Channel instead of a Chanel bag.)

There are billions of counterfeit products all over the world, but Amazon says it’s bent on not having any of them on their platform.

In its most recent Brand Protection Report, the company highlighted its efforts in cracking down fake products:

• 15,000 people were employed to find solutions to counterfeit issues
• $1.2 billion was invested in 2023 to hire people and develop relevant technologies
• 700,000 bad actors who attempted to create new selling accounts were stopped

But while the company is trying hard to prevent these problems, it hasn’t built a fool-proof system yet. Just last week, Amazon came under fire for allowing the sale of radio jammers, a product that is deemed illegal by the Federal Communications Commission. If an outlawed product can get through, it it’s not surprising if a couple of “lookalikes” make it into the marketplace as well.

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Etc.

Delayed refund. A faulty laptop that was ordered from Amazon India was returned, but the customer is unsatisfied with the length of time they had to wait for the refund. Both the third-party seller and Amazon were fined.

Cutting another check. Amazon is serious about its AI efforts as evidenced by the $2.75 billion investment it made in Anthropic, a front-runner in generative AI. The company has already invested $1.25 billion on the AI startup in the past.

Hefty compensation. How much does a company pay its CEO? We guess it must be a lot since Shopify just offered its CEO, Tobi Lutke, $200 million in stock awards.