The Pulse
Amazon Blocks Meta’s Muse From Shopping on Its Website
Amazon has blocked Meta’s Muse personal AI agent from shopping on Amazon.com, citing unauthorized access, credential handling and privacy concerns. The dispute adds a new layer to Amazon’s fight over AI agents that browse stores and buy pro
AI.info Team ·
Amazon has blocked Meta’s Muse personal AI agent from shopping on Amazon.com, cutting off one of the new assistant’s headline capabilities less than two weeks after its launch.
People trying to use Muse on Amazon saw a message stating that “Continued access by an unauthorized AI agent violates Amazon’s Conditions of Use.” Amazon says Meta did not tell it that Muse would access the store, and that the agent does not identify itself while browsing. GeekWire reported the block on September 20, 2026.
“Agentic third-party applications such as Muse have the same obligations,” an Amazon spokesperson said in a statement to GeekWire. Amazon said it had asked Meta to remove the retailer from Muse’s shopping experience and was in direct talks with the company.
Amazon Says Muse Enters Accounts Without Its Approval
Amazon’s objections center on how Muse reaches its store. The company says it was not informed in advance, that Muse appears to capture and store customer credentials, and that the agent can move through account pages and order history without identifying itself as an automated service.
Amazon argues that an agent operating inside a customer account can process transactions and handle sensitive information without the retailer’s knowledge or consent. The company contrasts that setup with food-delivery apps and online travel agencies, which typically have agreements with restaurants and airlines before placing orders for customers.
Meta did not immediately respond to GeekWire’s request for comment. The company has previously said that Muse cannot see users’ passwords or payment details. In its September 8 launch announcement, Meta said credentials entered into Muse go into secure storage and can be used without the agent seeing them.
Meta Designed Muse to Shop Through a Browser
Meta introduced Muse on September 8 as a personal agent that can perform multi-step tasks across email, travel, payments, dining and shopping. The company says Muse runs on a dedicated virtual machine with its own browser, continues working after a user closes the app, and asks for approval before sensitive actions such as sending an email or making a purchase.
Meta’s design creates the immediate point of conflict with Amazon. The company says Muse can connect through a public application programming interface when one exists. When a service has no API, Meta says the agent can use the website through a browser in the same way a person would.
Meta also says a separate Sentinel agent must approve anything Muse sends to the internet. Its launch materials describe a complete audit trail for actions and say that a one-time card number, generated through Stripe’s Link, keeps a customer’s real payment details away from the merchant and the agent.
Amazon Has Its Own Automated Shopping System
Amazon’s resistance comes as it expands its own AI shopping tools. The company renamed Rufus as Alexa for Shopping in May and has been adding features that research products, compare prices, add items to carts and complete some purchases automatically.
Amazon’s Buy for Me feature also purchases products from selected outside retailers. Amazon says that system identifies itself to merchants and gives brands a way to opt out, two controls it says are absent from Muse’s access to Amazon.com.
Amazon said its shopping assistant had been used by more than 250 million customers in 2026 in a company post published before the dispute. The company’s own tools keep the shopping session within Amazon’s account, product, advertising and transaction systems, while Muse places another company’s agent between Amazon and the customer.
The Block Follows Amazon’s Fight With Perplexity
The Muse dispute follows Amazon’s legal fight with Perplexity over Comet, the startup’s browser with an AI agent that shops on behalf of users. A federal judge granted Amazon a preliminary injunction in March, barring Comet from accessing password-protected areas of Amazon’s site for shopping.
The Ninth Circuit later ruled on August 4 that the user, rather than the AI company, was the party accessing Amazon’s computers under federal anti-hacking law. The court denied Amazon’s request for rehearing on September 10, although the ruling left Amazon’s contract and terms-of-service arguments available.
Amazon’s message to Muse users relies on those Conditions of Use rather than accusing Meta of hacking. The company declined to say whether it would take legal action against Meta.
A Dispute Over Who Controls the Purchase
The commercial stakes extend beyond whether a customer can place an order. Amazon generated more than $68 billion in advertising revenue last year, and its advertising business depends on shoppers browsing product pages, seeing sponsored listings and remaining inside Amazon’s environment.
Muse, by contrast, is designed to act as the customer’s intermediary across the web. Meta’s launch announcement says the agent can handle tasks after the user leaves the app and can return for approval when a transaction is ready. That model gives Meta a role in product discovery, account access and purchase decisions that Amazon has been trying to keep under its own control.
For now, Muse users can still use the agent on other websites, but Amazon shopping is unavailable through the blocked flow. The two companies are in direct talks, with no announced agreement on access, identification or credential handling.