Amazon Sued by 22 States Over Alleged Advertising Price Fixing

North Carolina Attorney General Jeff Jackson has joined forces with 21 other states to sue Amazon over allegations of an illegal advertising pricing scheme.

The lawsuit claims that since 2019, Amazon's bidding system has been manipulated to charge businesses more than $200 billion in advertising costs. This added expense is then passed on to consumers who regularly purchase goods from the e-commerce giant.

'Amazon secretly rigged its bidding system to charge businesses more, and customers paid the price,' said Attorney General Jeff Jackson. 'We believe Amazon manipulated its ad auctions to inflate what sellers had to pay, adding billions of dollars in costs that ultimately get passed on to customers with higher prices.'

The lawsuit alleges that Amazon employees internally discussed increasing hidden charges while hoping advertisers wouldn't notice and decrease their bids or ad spend.