It's been said more than once that Amazon has become the de facto search engine for e-commerce in the U.S. If consumers are looking to buy anything online, they start with Amazon and go from there. That reality has played into a suit filed against the company by a military-style watchmaker that claims Amazon's search results are confusing customers and leading them to purchase products other than its own.
In simple terms, Multi Time Machine (MTM) claims that consumers go to Amazon and use its name in a search. Instead of returning results that show MTM watches are not sold on the site, consumers see watches from other brands instead. The gist of suit is that these results lead consumers to purchase competitive products rather than notifying them that they must leave Amazon to find authentic MTM merchandise.
A search for MTM Watch in all departments on Amazon conducted by RetailWire turned up more than three pages of results of merchandise, mostly watches, made by other companies.
Source: amazon.com
In a 2-1 ruling on Monday, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled MTM could continue pursuing legal action against Amazon. Judges voting in favor of MTM believe a jury could conclude, "Amazon has created a likelihood of confusion" with its search results.
The dissenting judge, Judge Barry Silverman, wrote, "No reasonably prudent consumer accustomed to shopping online would likely be confused as to the source of the products."