Amazon Patent Intercepts In-Store Online Shopping

Business Insider reports:

Amazon has been granted a patent designed to stop you from visiting a shop to buy something, but then looking for a cheaper version online while you’re there. The patent, which we first saw via The Verge, would essentially try and intercept you if you made a price comparison search using the shop’s WiFi. It outlines a way that a retailer could intercept and analyse a network request, like a search term or URL.

If the retailer works out that you’re probably looking at a competitor’s site, it can try and persuade you back with a store coupon, show you that the item’s immediately available in-store, or offer a discounted version of the item. Retailers call this trend of looking at a product in-person and buying it online “showrooming”, and it’s something that’s been worrying them for a while.

More from the Washington Post:

Just because a company wins a patent doesn’t necessarily mean it’ll use it. Sometimes companies file for patents to ensure they have the option to put the idea into practice later, or to keep other companies from implementing the concept. So, a system such as the kind Amazon’s envisioning might never be rolled out. And even if it is, chances are shoppers could still get around the system by staying off the in-store WiFi.

But the patent takes on even greater significance as Amazon has expanded its brick-and-mortar ambitions. It has launched more than a half-dozen physical bookstores, with more on the way. And with the purchase of Whole Foods, Amazon will gain control over more than 465 physical grocery stores. Which gives Amazon an enormous stake in making sure that its customers don’t look for better deals right from its own baking aisle.