By Bogdana Zujic
Publication Date: 2026-08-05 21:53:00
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned a ruling that had temporarily barred Perplexity from using its AI-powered agentic shopping tools on Amazon’s platform, delivering the first federal appeals court decision on whether AI agents acting for users can legally access online services. The San Francisco-based appeals court found Amazon unlikely to succeed on its claim that Perplexity’s AI agents violated federal computer-hacking law.
The dispute centers on Perplexity’s Comet browser, whose AI assistant can log into users’ online shopping accounts and place orders on their behalf. Amazon sued Perplexity in November 2025, accusing the startup of covertly accessing private customer accounts and alleging breaches of both the federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act and California’s Comprehensive Computer Data Access and Fraud Act.
A federal judge in California granted a temporary injunction in March 2026 after finding Amazon presented “strong evidence” the AI agent broke U.S. computer fraud law.
The three-judge panel disagreed, ruling that Perplexity’s users were the ones who “accessed” Amazon’s platform under the law, not Perplexity itself. Because Comet requires user direction to operate on Amazon, the court determined the AI assistant functions as a tool acting on the user’s instructions rather than an independent intruder.
The same reasoning applied to Amazon’s California law claim.
Perplexity had dismissed the lawsuit as a “bald attempt” to block users from Comet,…