The Federal Trade Commission is expected to file an antitrust lawsuit against Amazon over its alleged anti-competitive business practices as early as Tuesday, according to a report.
The long-awaited legal action by FTC Chair Lina Khan is expected to take aim at what its critics charge are Amazon’s monopolistic behavior in the online retail space, according to the news site Politico.
Khan — who rose to prominence with a 2017 paper she wrote as a Yale Law School student that was highly critical of the Jeff Bezos-founded company — wants the court to break up Amazon’s $1.3 trillion empire.
The FTC, which currently has no Republican appointees, also wants other states to join in the lawsuit in a show of bipartisan force, according to Politico.
The possible showdown comes as Google faces its own landmark antitrust fight against the Justice Department.
Antitrust advocates have long alleged that Amazon has abused its market position by requiring third-party retailers to offer their lowest prices on Amazon’s website — effectively eliminating competition.
The FTC is also reportedly targeting Amazon Prime, the free delivery subscription service which critics charge has accumulated too much market share by bundling offerings such as books, music, and video streaming.
On Friday, Amazon said it plans to start putting advertisements in the TV shows and movies on its Prime Video streaming platform to shore up profits.
Amazon has also been accused by antitrust advocates of incentivizing sellers to use the company’s logistics services, including shipping and warehousing, by offering them better placement on its website.
The company is also alleged to have forced merchants to buy ads on Amazon’s web site in order to get better product placement in customer search results.
The Post has sought comment from Amazon and the FTC.
In August, Amazon lawyers and executives failed to convince Khan and two other Democrat-appointed FTC commissioners to drop their investigation.
Amazon has argued that Khan is biased against the e-commerce giant.
The 34-year-old antitrust crusader has filed three lawsuits against Amazon since being appointed FTC chair by President Joe Biden in 2021.
Amazon has demanded that Khan recuse herself from antitrust probes into its business given her past criticisms of the company — to no avail.
The agency sued Amazon earlier this year for allegedly engaging in a years-long effort to enroll consumers without consent into Amazon Prime and making it difficult for them to cancel their subscriptions.
The FTC accused Amazon of using deceptive designs, known as “dark patterns,” to fool consumers into enrolling in Prime, which provides subscribers with perks such as faster shipping for a fee of $139 annually, or $14.99 a month.
The FTC said Amazon made it difficult for customers to purchase an item without also subscribing to Prime.
In some cases, consumers were presented with a button to complete their transactions — which didn’t clearly state it would also enroll them in Prime.
Amazon denied the FTC’s allegations.
In June, Amazon agreed to pay a $25 million civil penalty to settle allegations it violated a child privacy law for storing kids’ voice and location data recorded by its popular Alexa voice assistant.
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