Amazon adds new claim against Perplexity's shopping agent

Amazon’s lawsuit against Perplexity over its Comet shopping agent — the case the wire covered Aug 5, when the Ninth Circuit reversed a lower court’s order blocking Comet — has moved forward with new allegations, per The Fashion Law. In a Sept 21 amended complaint, Amazon added a claim of tortious interference with contract, meaning Amazon says Perplexity knowingly induced Amazon customers to break Amazon’s Conditions of Use by letting Comet access Amazon’s marketplace. Amazon also alleges Comet for iOS used customers’ copied login cookies to connect Perplexity’s own cloud servers directly to Amazon’s systems from March 18 through at least May 11, bypassing the user’s device, and that Perplexity told the Ninth Circuit the opposite was true while that was happening. Perplexity denies the new claims and, in an Oct 13 motion to dismiss — asking the court to throw the case out before trial — argues Amazon’s Conditions of Use don’t meet the legal bar for a contract-interference claim and that Amazon’s underlying computer-access theories are the same ones the Ninth Circuit already rejected. No ruling has been made on the motion.