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Bezos: No guarantee Amazon didn't exploit third-party seller data

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos said Wednesday he can't guarantee employees have never used sales data from individual third-party sellers to develop the company's own products, despite a policy against that practice and past denials that Amazon engages in it.
Why it matters: Lawmakers and Amazon competitors and sellers have repeatedly hammered the e-commerce giant over accusations that Amazon accesses data on third-party sellers to boost its own house-label products. Bezos is admitting he can't rule out that this has happened.
Context: Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal, whose Seattle district is in Amazon's backyard, pressed Bezos on the issue during a House Judiciary antitrust panel hearing.
- Jayapal noted press reports that seem to contradict past testimony from Amazon associate general counsel Nate Sutton, who told her the company "does not use specific seller data" when creating its own private label products.
What they're saying: "I can't guarantee you that policy has never been violated," Bezos said, a striking admission that while Amazon does not allow this practice, it may be happening anyway. “I'm not yet satisfied we’ve gotten to the bottom of that."
Of note: Amazon has acknowledged that it does look at aggregate data on third-party sales in the course of developing its own products; its policy is only against singling out sellers.
- Under questioning from GOP Rep. Kelly Armstrong Wednesday, Bezos said that aggregate data can cover as few as two sellers, as opposed to strictly reflecting broad sales trends across product categories.
What's next: Bezos said Amazon would keep looking at this issue, and his admission ensures Amazon will continue to face major scrutiny over it.
Putin, Biden talk tough ahead of Wednesday's summit
Sending a bearish signalfor Wednesday's summit, Russian President Vladimir Putin gave an aggressive preview interview to NBC News, denying cyber-hacking and portraying suspects in the Capitol riot as political prisoners.
Why it matters: This is looking like the rare head of state sit-down where no amount of diplomatic fluff can paper over the gulf between the two countries.
Zoom out: Both President Biden and Putin say U.S.-Russia relations are at their worst levels in years.
- In a measure of White House caution, Biden plans a solo news conference after the Geneva meeting, rather than a joint appearance with Putin.
Biden, at a press conference on Monday at the NATO summit in Brussels, said Putin is "bright, he's tough, and I have found that he is ... a worthy adversary."
- But Biden saidthat if the Russian "chooses not to cooperate, and acts in a way that he has in the past relative to cybersecurity and some other activities ... we will respond in kind."
Putin, who sat down with NBC's Keir Simmons in Moscow, made a string of antagonistic assertions.
- On ransomware attacks: "[W]here is the evidence? Where is proof? ... Russia has nothing to do with it."
- Putin refused to guarantee that opposition leader Alexei Navalny would leave prison alive: "[T]hat is something that the administration of the specific prison or penitentiary establishment is responsible for."
- When the reporter noted that Putin wasn't saying Navalny's name, the president responded: "For me, he [is] one of the citizens of the Russian Federation who has been found guilty by a court of law and is in prison. There are many citizens like that."
- On the Capitol insurrectionists: "[T]hey're looking at jail time ... And they came to the Congress with political demands. Isn't that persecution for political opinions?"