Amazon Accused of Inflating Ad Prices to Billions

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has filed a bombshell lawsuit against Amazon, alleging that the e-commerce giant manipulated ad prices on its website to bilk advertisers out of tens of billions of dollars.

The suit claims that Amazon secretly placed its own bids in ad auctions to inflate prices and increase profits. The alleged scheme started in 2018 under founder Jeff Bezos' leadership and continued through 2024, affecting over 1.2 million advertising customers.

The FTC alleges that Amazon's strategy raised the pay-per-click ad cost by 50% on major shopping days and intervened in auctions to raise the minimum price 70% to 80% of the time. The company allegedly gave its customers no notice of this change and took affirmative steps to conceal it.

A bipartisan group of 22 attorneys general from California, Florida, New York, Louisiana, and Iowa have joined the FTC in this suit. Amazon has responded by stating that its ad practices had no impact on consumers and that it properly disclosed how its auctions work.