Internal Documents Show Amazon Has For Years Knowingly Tricked People Into Signing Up for Prime Subscriptions

Amazon has worried for years that it tricks customers into signing up for Prime subscriptions. A previously undisclosed inquiry from the Federal Trade Commission has put more pressure on the company to fix it. Business Insider: Internal documents obtained by Insider show the company has been concerned since at least 2017 that user interface designs on Amazon.com have led customers to feel manipulated into signing up for Prime. These design decisions, commonly known as "dark patterns," push customers into acting unintentionally often through misleading imagery or intentionally vague offers. For example, a single click on the "Get FREE Two-Day Delivery with Prime" tab at check out -- with no additional confirmation step -- gets shoppers automatically enrolled into a 30-day free trial of Amazon's Prime program, which later converts to a paid membership unless the user cancels it. For cancellations, users have to jump through a number of pages to end the subscription. Amazon was aware of these complaints for years but did not take serious action, according to these previously unreported internal documents and six current and former employees who spoke to Insider. In several cases, fixes for these issues were proposed and considered, but resulted in lower subscription growth when tested, and were shelved by executives, the documents show.

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