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Amazon Escapes Fines in EU Antitrust Settlement

The company has agreed to change certain business practices that regulators flagged as harmful.

Online retail giant Amazon has reached a settlement with the European Union in two antitrust cases over its treatment of third-party sellers. The company will avoid having to pay a fine as part of the settlement, but it has agreed to change certain business practices that regulators flagged as harmful, The Wall Street Journal reports. Regulators had accused the company of violating anti-competition law by weaponizing non-public data on sellers in order to give its own rival products a competitive edge. Amazon was also accused of treating sellers unfairly when ranking them for the website’s “buy box” program. “The Commission found that Amazon’s final commitments will ensure that Amazon does not use marketplace seller data for its own retail operations and that it grants non-discriminatory access to Buy Box and Prime,” the European Commission said in a statement.