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Consultant for Amazon Seller Avoids Imprisonment in Bribery of Staff

Lanon Wee

On Friday, Ephraim "Ed" Rosenberg, an Amazon seller consultant, was handed probation and house arrest due to his part in a plan to give bribes to enterprise personnel for confidential information in order to help his clients. In 2020, Rosenberg and five other people were accused by federal authorities of conspiring to participate in bribery. Ephraim "Ed" Rosenberg, a prominent Amazon consultant, was sentenced Friday in a federal court to two years of probation, 12 months of house arrest, and a $100,000 fine for his involvement in a scheme to bribe company employees for confidential information that would have benefited third-party merchants selling goods on Amazon's online marketplace. Rosenberg, 48, is a well-known figure in the world of Amazon third-party sellers, running a consultancy business that advises entrepreneurs on how to navigate the e-commerce giant's sprawling marketplace. His Facebook group for sellers, ASGTG, has over 70,000 members, and he hosts a popular annual conference for merchants in Brooklyn. Prosecutors recommended a lesser sentence for Rosenberg because there was no evidence he initiated attacks on competing product listings, like falsely lodging complaints to Amazon or buying fake negative reviews. However, between July 2017 and Sept. 2020, Rosenberg was found to have paid bribes directly and indirectly to Amazon employees to gain access to internal data or systems. The case also shines a light on the competition-driven industry that has flourished alongside the growth of Amazon's third-party marketplace. Sellers - many of them small and medium-sized businesses - have sought to gain an edge by resorting to illicit tactics such as artificially boosting their listings or bypassing the platform's rules. This is not the first time Amazon has been faced with incidents of employees leaking confidential information or manipulating the site for financial gain. The company has since invested hundreds of millions of dollars to ensure products are safe and compliant, but the desperation of sellers has driven some to seek out unscrupulous means to gain an advantage. Rosenberg admitted to making false statements about the case and issued a public apology, but argued the desperate state of Amazon sellers had led to an environment where illicit tactics were used.

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