Amazon sends legal threats to Perplexity over proxy browsing

Amazon has asked Perplexity to remove its proxy browser from its online store, something the two companies confirmed publicly on Tuesday. After warning Perplexity multiple times that Comet, its AI-powered shopping assistant, was violating Amazon’s terms of service by not identifying itself as an agent, the e-commerce giant sent the AI ​​search engine startup a strongly worded cease-and-desist letter, Perplexity wrote in a blog post titled “Bullying Is Not Innovation.”

“This week, Perplexity received a strong legal threat from Amazon, demanding that we block Comet users from using their AI assistants on Amazon. This is Amazon’s first legal attack against an AI company, and it represents a threat to all Internet users,” Perplexity lamented in the blog post.

Perplexity’s argument is that because its agent is acting on behalf of a human user’s directives, the agent automatically has “the same permissions” as a human user. The implication is that it is not necessary to identify oneself as an agent.

Amazon’s response notes that other third-party agents acting at the request of human users identify themselves. “It’s how others work, including the food delivery apps and restaurants they take orders from, the delivery service apps and stores they shop from, and the online travel agencies and airlines they book tickets with for customers,” Amazon’s statement explains.

If we’re to believe Amazon, Perplexity can simply select its dealer and start shopping. Of course, the risk is that Amazon, which has its own shopping bot called Rufus, could also ban Comet — or any other third-party shopping agent — from its site.

Amazon suggests the same in its statement, which also says: “We think it’s fairly clear that third-party apps that offer to make purchases on behalf of customers from other companies should operate openly and respect the service provider’s decisions about whether or not to participate.”

Perplexity claims Amazon will ban the shopping bot because Amazon wants to sell ads and product placements. Unlike human shoppers, a robot tasked with purchasing a new laundry basket would presumably not find itself buying a more expensive basket, or being tempted to buy Brandon Sanderson’s latest novel and a new set of headphones (on sale!).

If this all sounds a little familiar, that’s because it is. A few months ago, Cloudflare published a paper accusing Perplexity of stealing websites while specifically challenging requests from websites that ban AI bots. Interestingly, many people defended Perplexity at the time, because this was not a clear case of bad behavior by a web crawler. Cloudflare documented how an AI accessed a specific public website when its user asked about that specific site. Puzzlers have argued that this is exactly what every human-operated web browser does.

Perplexity, on the other hand, was using some questionable methods to gain that access when a website opts out of bots, such as hiding its identity.

As TechCrunch reported at the time, it was a harbinger of things to come if the proxy world materialized as Silicon Valley predicted. If consumers and businesses outsource their shopping, travel and restaurant reservations to robots, would it be in the best interests of websites to ban bots entirely? How will they allow them and work with them?

You may be rightly confused that Amazon is setting a precedent. As the 800-pound gorilla in e-commerce, it’s clear that the way this should work is for the agent to identify themselves and let the website make the decision.