A U.S. court has allowed Perplexity to use AI agents to make purchases on Amazon
A U.S. appeals court overturned a lower court’s ruling that had temporarily barred Perplexity from using its AI agents to make purchases on the Amazon platform. This marks the first ruling by a federal appeals court to define the legal boundaries of agent-based artificial intelligence.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, based in San Francisco, concluded that Amazon is unlikely to be able to prove that Perplexity violated the federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.
The court noted that users themselves accessed the Amazon platform through Perplexity’s AI agents, rather than the company directly, so the allegations of unauthorized access were not sufficiently substantiated.
Amazon filed the lawsuit back in November, accusing Perplexity of using its Comet browser and integrated AI agent to allegedly access users’ private accounts and make purchases on their behalf.
The lawsuit stated that such technology poses security risks and that Perplexity allegedly ignored demands to cease using the service.
In March, a federal court in California agreed with Amazon’s arguments and temporarily banned the use of Perplexity’s AI agents on the platform.
Following the appellate court’s decision, an Amazon spokesperson stated:
“We respectfully disagree with today’s decision regarding the preliminary injunction. We remain confident in our position and are evaluating our next steps.”
Perplexity, for its part, emphasized that it will continue to defend users’ right to choose which AI tools they use.
“Perplexity will continue to fight for the right of internet users to choose any AI they wish to use. We have always been confident that the truth will prevail and that users’ rights will not be gradually eroded,” said company spokesperson Jesse Dwyer.
Experts note that this is the first federal appeals court ruling in the U.S. that directly concerns agent-based artificial intelligence.
Such systems are capable of independently planning actions, analyzing information, browsing websites, making purchases, and conducting online transactions with minimal human intervention.
The court’s ruling could set an important precedent for the further development and legal regulation of agent-based AI systems in the U.S.
This was reported by Reuters.
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