There's an active black market for Amazon sellers looking to get their accounts reinstated and help them get an edge over rivals,
according to CNBC, which found an instant-messaging group of over 13,000 members seeking and offering such services - and that wasn't the only group they found.
The news outlet reported that some Amazon employees leaked the data in exchange for money, and said it found that the company had an internal team dedicated to investigating employees suspected of corruption.
The information about the practices is shocking, but not exactly new. Some of the information sellers seek to help them appeal their suspensions is referred to as "annotations." Last month, one consultant charged by the government in the infamous bribery scheme
detailed the role annotations played in his business in his sentencing memorandum:
"Given that these sellers were in the dark about their alleged wrongdoing, how to correct the problem, and when Amazon might recognize its error, sellers were frequently desperate and sometimes would resort to illegal means to obtain the information necessary to accomplish the goal of saving their businesses.
"The 'information necessary' was the annotations. Annotations were an internal record of the reasons a seller was suspended. Having the annotation - the written record of exactly why a seller's account had been suspended - was very helpful in devising a plan of action to get the account reinstated or explain to Amazon why the account had been wrongly suspended."
Some sellers believe marketplaces like Amazon shouldn't be secretive about the reasons it suspends sellers. It appears sellers who write their appeals with knowledge of the annotations from Amazon reps have a much better shot at getting reinstated than those who don't have access to the annotations - is something wrong with that picture?
As a matter of principle, isn't it only right that marketplaces provide customers (sellers) with the reason for their suspension? Transparency might also eliminate much of the illegal activity.
Information in the CNBC article also raises the question of whether marketplaces should ever have offshored customer service. Amazon "has in the past dealt with low-level, low-wage seller support staffers in China, India and Costa Rica who have accepted payments in exchange for leaking information," according to its reporting. That's not to say it's a "foreign" problem, but rather a "low-wage" problem.
Even domestic workers are susceptible, according to government allegations in the Amazon bribery case, which said one defendant paid $18,650 to an Amazon employee located in Seattle "in exchange for misappropriated and confidential information about various 3P seller accounts."
The AuctionBytes Blog has been giving a voice to online merchants since its launch in 2005. Named one of the world's top 30 blogs in 2008 by "Blogging Heroes." Weigh in with your thoughts on the joys and pitfalls of selling online.
Sellers Turn to Black Market to Get Accounts Back
by: Rexford 