Appeals court rules AI shopping agents can act for users on Amazon

A US appeals court overturned an injunction that had blocked Perplexity's AI shopping agent from operating on Amazon, ruling that it is the user, not the startup, who is accessing the site. It is the first federal appeals court decision on whether AI agents can act on online platforms on behalf of users.

Why it matters: This sets a legal precedent for how far AI agents can act on people's behalf across e-commerce and other platforms, directly limiting how companies like Amazon can use injunctions to block bot traffic. Expect platforms to shift toward technical or contractual restrictions instead, and expect this ruling to become the reference point for the next wave of agent-versus-platform legal disputes.