Perplexity Comet hurtling toward Amazon ban

"The court on Monday issued an administrative stay of its order for seven days to allow Perplexity to seek relief from the US Court of Appeals, which the company intends to do. Perplexity will continue to fight for the right of internet users to choose whatever AI they want."

"The court order casts a shadow on the widely hyped agent economy that imagines software agents visiting websites and buying things on behalf of human users. It finds that Amazon is likely to succeed in its claims that Perplexity has violated federal and state computer fraud laws by disguising its bot and breaking Amazon's site access rules."

"The judge's take on the case suggests automated e-commerce transactions will require negotiation and agreements as opposed to the tech industry's preference to move fast and break things. Evidence of this can be seen in eBay's decision earlier this year to update its user agreement to ban shopping bots."

Amazon successfully obtained a preliminary injunction against Perplexity's AI browser Comet, prohibiting it from accessing Amazon's systems. The court found Perplexity likely violated federal and state computer fraud laws by disguising its bot and violating Amazon's access rules. A seven-day administrative stay allows Perplexity to appeal to the US Court of Appeals. The ruling impacts the emerging agent economy concept where software agents autonomously conduct transactions. The court's decision suggests automated e-commerce will require formal agreements rather than unilateral access, as evidenced by eBay's earlier decision to ban shopping bots. Amazon's lawsuit alleged Perplexity deliberately disguised its automated browser as a Chrome customer, violated data-gathering prohibitions, and created security risks by requiring users to expose login credentials.

Read at Theregister