Angie’s List Says Amazon Local Stole Secrets

The consumer reviews service has had enough with the eCommerce giant’s subsidiary Amazon Local, accusing the company of stealing provider lists and other proprietary information.

Angie’s List filed a federal lawsuit against Amazon late last week in Indianapolis, which alleges executives and other employees at Amazon Local signed up as Angie’s members in order to copy provider profiles, member reviews and other information, The Indianapolis Star reported on Tuesday (June 23).

According to the lawsuit, the information gathered is being used to create a competing service to Angie’s List.

“Amazon Local has chosen not to devote the necessary time, resources and effort to compete legitimately with Angie’s List and to develop its own research to identify and solicit service providers to work with. Instead, Amazon Local and its employees have chosen the shortcut of surreptitiously accessing and misappropriating Angie’s List’s proprietary information,” the lawsuit alleges.

The lawsuit accuses Amazon Local of a myriad of bad behavior, including misappropriation of trade secrets, theft, computer trespass, civil conspiracy, violations of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act and breach of contract, The Associated Press confirmed.

The employees who allegedly stole the information are listed in the lawsuit as codefendants; among them are Amazon Local’s product launch specialist, software development manager and several regional marketing consultants and account executives.

Angie’s List spokeswoman Cheryl Reed released a brief statement about the lawsuit, telling The Indianapolis Star, “Angie’s List has spent more than 20 years developing our substantial database of proprietary information relating to home improvement service providers, consumer preferences and expectations, and industry standards across the country. This information is available to Angie’s List customers for personal use — not for other businesses to use for commercial gain. We welcome competition but on fair and legal grounds.”

Angie’s List is seeking an injunction prohibiting Amazon Local’s access to its site and the use of any proprietary information it may have previously gained. Angie’s also requested unspecified compensatory and punitive damages.

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