Amazon Purges Roughly 20,000 Seller Accounts, Shifts Video Verification to Authentic Identity Validation

News emerged on September 20 that Amazon conducted a concentrated crackdown on approximately 20,000 seller accounts ahead of the August-September peak sales season, with a focus on accounts that passed virtual identity video verification as specified in Section 3 of its seller policies. Some sellers reported that they were rejected even after answering all verification questions correctly; reviewers cited that applicants did not appear to be legitimate Amazon operators, but rather seemed to be reciting pre-memorized answers.

Meanwhile, a range of fraudulent verification tactics have been uncovered, including forged employee credentials, marriage certificates, and social security records. Bad actors even went so far as to create counterfeit Alipay apps embedded with falsified employee social security information, yet none of these schemes managed to evade the platform’s dual review process combining automated system checks and manual audits.

This risk control upgrade is essentially a countermeasure against the long-standing practice of grey-market account intermediaries that coach sellers on verification workarounds. With the integration of AI technology, the platform can trace and link historical violation records, which may trigger account fund freezes.

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