On November 8, local time, Amazon's lawyers asked a federal judge to dismiss the Federal Trade Commission's (FTC) antitrust lawsuit against it.。Amazon claims the FTC is attacking policies that benefit consumers and competition。

More than two months ago, the FTC joined 17 states in a historic complaint against Amazon, accusing it of driving up prices and stifling competition in the "online supermarket marketplace" and "online marketplace services" segments.。

In a 31-page filing with a federal court in Washington state, Amazon hit back, saying that the FTC's anti-competitive labeling included common retail practices that benefit consumers.。Amazon argues that the lawsuit conflates common retail practices with anti-competitive behavior and fails to identify the damage caused to consumers.。

The FTC, in a lawsuit filed in September, accuses Amazon of engaging in anti-competitive behavior by taking steps to prevent third-party sellers from offering lower prices on non-Amazon sites.。

The agency says Amazon hides items offered at lower prices on other sites。At the same time, the FTC noted that Amazon is charging merchants more and more, causing prices for products on its website to push up further.。The FTC said the average fee Amazon charges sellers who use its delivery service increased from 27 percent in 2014 to 39 percent in 2018..5%。The FTC claims that Amazon makes sellers rely on services such as its logistics and delivery services, which allow it to earn billions of dollars a year.。

In rejecting the request, Amazon said: "Amazon quickly catches up with competitors' discounts, launches competitively priced deals instead of overpriced deals, and ensures a first-class service for its Prime users."。Amazon believes these practices benefit consumers and are the nature of competition.。But it was used by the FTC as its antitrust evidence.。

Amazon also said use of Amazon's delivery service is voluntary, including products sold using its Prime service.。

An unredacted version of the lawsuit filed by the Federal Trade Commission last November said Amazon used a tool codenamed "Nessie" to predict where it could raise prices and let other shopping sites follow suit.。The agency said Amazon used the algorithm to raise prices on some products and kept up with new price increases after other sites followed suit.。

In a filing on Friday, Amazon said the company had experimented with an "automated pricing system" several years ago.。The company believes that Nessie's purpose is to compete with the second-lowest-priced competitor, not the absolute lowest, because of limited product and maturity.。Amazon also said it discontinued the system in 2019, and the company currently has the lowest prices on par with other companies.。

Amazon also refuted the FTC's allegations that the company had a monopoly.。The company said in the filing that it faces competition from small retailers to large online and brick-and-mortar businesses such as Wal-Mart, Target, Best Buy and Apple.。

The FTC's antitrust investigation into Amazon has a long history.。Amazon was reportedly notified of the initial investigation back in June 2019.。Two months later, Amazon was asked for the first time to provide a variety of related records, including its warehousing and delivery services.。In February 2020, the FTC issued a mandatory document request for Amazon to provide more information about its web services cloud computing division.。

The antitrust lawsuit would be the fourth charge filed by the FTC against Amazon this year.。The three previous lawsuits involved the illegal collection of children's data by Alexa's voice assistant, the violation of user privacy by the Ring department, and Amazon's private subscription to Amazon Prime for consumers.。In the first two cases, Amazon paid a total of $30.8 million in settlements.。

In addition to this, the FTC is also looking at Amazon's acquisition of robot vacuum cleaner manufacturer iRobot.。The deal is currently being blocked by EU regulators。