The US House Judicial Committee summoned Amazon founder Jeff Bezos to testify before it of "concerns about competition" related to the company's business practices.
Bezos, who is the wealthiest of the year with a fortune, estimated at $ 149 billion, will not be the only CEO of one of the major technology companies, Amazon, Apple, Google and Facebook, which is being questioned in front of Congress, it was preceded by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and others.
In a letter to Bezos signed by Democrats and Republicans, members said, "If what was published on the Wall Street Journal is accurate, the Amazon data that I submitted to the committee about the company's business practices appears to be misleading, and it may be false and incorrect to require criminal accountability."
Members were referring to an article published in the Wall Street Journal on April 23 about Amazon practices.
According to CNBC, the commission’s request came after an investigation by The Wall Street Journal that revealed Amazon employees ’unauthorized data regarding external vendors cooperating with the company, while reviewing the product strategy.
The investigation was based on an interview with more than 20 former company employees and other documents seen by the newspaper, and committee members wrote to Bezos: "If these allegations are accurate, then the data Amazon has submitted to the committee regarding the company's business practices appears to be misleading, possibly false or criminally harmful." ".
House of Representatives anti-monopoly subcommittee David Cecilin said the report showed that Amazon "may have lied to Congress" in its earlier testimony before the committee.
At a hearing in July 2019, the associate general counsel for the company, Nate Sutton, said that "Amazon" does not use the individual data of each vendor to clarify its strategy.
The company has faced scrutiny over the past year as lawmakers and regulators evaluate privacy and dominance issues among technology companies.