Combating Organized Retail Crime
Organized retail crime (ORC) is an issue that affects the entire retail industry. At Amazon, we take a holistic approach to the systematic theft and resale of stolen goods. Using advanced technology, collaborative approaches, and aggressive enforcement actions, we go beyond our retail supply chain to shut down bad actors that facilitate and scale ORC activity globally.
Amazon has zero tolerance for any form of organized retail crime and leverages sophisticated detection and prevention solutions across our stores and fulfillment operations, allowing us to quickly spot a range of ORC schemes like theft through retail concessions, cargo theft, and potential resale of stolen goods in our store.
To enhance security, we invest in technology that makes our facilities safer and more secure for our employees and the companies that trust us to store their inventory. This includes the use of geofencing, which creates virtual perimeters around locations known for theft activity. This system provides real-time notifications of driver and carrier activity near these sites. By combining this data with a historical analysis of their previous locations, we can identify and prevent high-risk drivers or carriers who have left the system from attempting to regain access under different credentials. Additionally, we educate our transportation partners to increase awareness of suspicious behavior and protect loads while in transit.
We work to prevent stolen goods from being sold on Amazon before products are listed on our store. We use advanced technology and expert human reviewers to verify the identities of potential sellers. When prospective sellers apply to sell in Amazon’s store, they are required to provide a form of government-issued photo IDs, along with other information about their business. We employ advanced identity detection methods like document forgery detection, image and video verification, and other technologies to confirm the authenticity of government-issued IDs and verify they match the individual applying to sell in our store.
Amazon has invested in proactive tools such as Amazon Transparency, an item serialization service that uses unique codes to identify each manufactured unit of an enrolled product. This allows us to have a clearer picture of where a product is on the journey to the customer, and shows great promise in tracking and detecting stolen items. We continue to innovate and improve our programs, including recently expanding Transparency to become interoperable with brands’ existing product serialization systems, allowing brands to benefit from Transparency’s protections easier, faster, and without requiring changes to their existing manufacturing and packaging processes. More than 88,000 brands are enrolled in Transparency, and we will continue to invest in these and other technologies in order to always stay one step ahead of bad actors.
Amazon participates in, and advocates for, public and private partnerships that take a collaborative approach to combating organized retail crime. We work directly with the retail industry, including brands and retailers, to investigate criminal schemes and regularly work with law enforcement, prosecutors, and state attorney generals to shut down illicit wholesalers and distributors of stolen goods. We sit on U.S. state retail and organized crime associations, and serve on 10 attorney general-led ORC task forces. These public-private partnerships work collaboratively on ORC, sharing information, investigating cases, taking enforcement action, and collaborating on legislative efforts to stop bad actors.
If a customer, retailer, or brand suspects a product for sale is stolen, they can easily report it through the product detail page. Law enforcement can also report these crimes by emailing us here. Amazon investigates every allegation of stolen merchandise provided to us, and regularly requests invoices, purchase orders, or other proof of sourcing when we have concerns about how a product was obtained.
The more suspicious activity is reported to Amazon, the better our tools get at identifying bad actors so we can take action against them. Customers can report suspicious activity here.
