Perplexity Rejects Amazon’s Legal Notice, Calls It ‘Bullying’

Perplexity AI has publicly rejected a legal notice from Amazon asking it to stop its Comet browser’s AI agent from transacting on Amazon’s platform. In an open letter titled "Bullying is Not Innovation", Perplexity framed the confrontation as more than a platform dispute — it called the matter a test case for who controls agentic assistants and how far users can delegate actions online.

You can Read the Blog Post here:https://www.perplexity.ai/hub/blog/bullying-is-not-innovation

Why Amazon sent the notice

Amazon’s legal move, according to the exchange, seeks to prevent Perplexity’s Comet assistant from completing purchases on users’ behalf. Amazon described the issue as one of platform integrity and merchant choice, saying:

"Third-party apps making purchases for users should operate transparently and respect businesses' decisions on whether to participate," Amazon said in a statement.

From Amazon’s perspective, concerns include potential impacts on the customer experience and on merchants’ merchandising models. The company has flagged how third-party agents might change the signals it relies on — for example, by shifting how discovery, recommendations, and ad-driven monetisation work on its shopfront.

Perplexity’s defense: user agents are users’ agents

Perplexity answered with a public blog post and an open letter that frames the dispute as a fight for user choice and against the market power of large platforms. The company’s tone is direct and unequivocal in places: "The point of technology is to make life better for people. We call it innovation, but it's just the constant process of asking how to make things better. Bullying, on the other hand, is when large corporations use legal threats and intimidation to block innovation and make life worse for people."

Perplexity stresses how Comet handles credentials and transactions: the agent stores user credentials locally — not on Perplexity’s servers — and acts only at the user's request to find and buy items or to compare options and pick the best value.

In Perplexity’s framing, the feature is about saving users time and expanding choice: "Easier shopping means more transactions and happier customers. But Amazon doesn't care—they're more interested in serving you ads," the company said.

Perplexity also positioned the legal threat as a warning shot to the wider agent ecosystem: "This week, Perplexity received an aggressive legal threat from Amazon, demanding we prohibit Comet users from using their AI assistants on Amazon. This is Amazon's first legal salvo against an AI company, and it is a threat to all internet users."

Perplexity paints concrete user scenarios: a logged-in customer asks Comet to find and purchase an item or to compare alternatives and buy the best match. The company argues these are legitimate — and increasingly common — uses of on-device AI assistants that treat software as a tool or helper, not as an intermediary that replaces user agency.

Perplexity’s editorial line appeals to the historical role of software as a “wrench in the hands of the user”, extending that metaphor to agentic AI: "For the last 50 years, software has been a tool, like a wrench in the hands of the user. But with the rise of agentic AI, software is also becoming labour: an assistant, an employee, an agent."

By that logic, blocking user-chosen agents from acting on their behalf would be equivalent to denying people tools that increase their productivity.

The platform-versus-agent dilemma

This dispute highlights a deepening tension: platforms want to protect the integrity of their merchant ecosystems and ad-driven models; agent builders argue for interoperability and user autonomy. Both positions raise legitimate concerns. Platforms cite merchandising, trust, and fraud considerations. Agent makers raise valid questions about choice, competition and the user experience.

Perplexity’s rhetoric is deliberately confrontational: "Bullying is when large corporations use legal threats and intimidation to block innovation and make life worse for people." Whether that framing resonates with regulators, judges, or the broader public may depend on technical details and demonstrable consumer harm or benefit.

What’s Next for AI Agents and Big Tech

• Whether Perplexity and Amazon reach a commercial or technical compromise that allows vetted agent transactions under clear rules.
• Any regulatory interest in how agentic AI interfaces with major platforms and marketplaces.
• How other agents and browser vendors respond; whether they lock down purchases, build workarounds, or seek common standards for agent authentication and merchant consent.

The Perplexity–Amazon dispute is an early, high-profile clash over who controls automated agents acting on users’ behalf. At stake are user choice, platform business models, and the practical rules that will govern agent behaviour online. Perplexity frames the fight as a defense of user agency; Amazon frames it as a platform-protection and transparency issue. The outcome could shape how agentic AI integrates with e-commerce and whether users can smoothly delegate shopping to the assistants they choose.