Privacy Policy

Privacy Notice

Last Updated: 31st August 2022.

For users in Australia or New Zealand, please see here.

To view a summary of the previous Privacy Notice please click here.

We know that you care how information about you is used and shared and we appreciate your trust in us to do that carefully and sensibly. This Privacy Notice describes how we collect and process your personal information through Amazon websites, devices, products, services, online and physical stores, and applications that reference this Privacy Notice (together "Amazon Services").

Controllers of Personal Information

Amazon Europe Core SARL, Amazon EU SARL, Amazon Services Europe SARL and Amazon Media EU SARL, all four at 38 avenue John F. Kennedy, L-1855, Luxembourg and Amazon Digital UK Limited of 1 Principal Place, Worship Street, London, EC2A 2FA, UK (together "Amazon Europe") are data controllers of personal information collected and processed through Amazon Services. Details can be found here.

EU-US and Swiss-US Privacy Shield

Amazon.com, Inc. participates in the EU-US and Swiss-US Privacy Shield frameworks. Click here to learn more.

What Personal Information About Customers Does Amazon Europe Collect?

We collect your personal information in order to provide and continually improve our products and services.

Here are the types of information we gather:

  • Information You Give Us: we receive and store any information you provide in relation to Amazon Services. Click here to see examples of what we collect. You can choose not to provide certain information but then you might not be able to take advantage of many of our Amazon Services.
  • Automatic Information: we automatically receive and store certain types of information when you use Amazon Services, such as information about your use, including your interaction with content and services available through Amazon Services. Like many websites, we use cookies and other unique identifiers and we obtain certain types of information when your web browser or device accesses Amazon Services and other content served by or on behalf of Amazon Europe on other websites. Click here to see examples of what we collect.
  • Information From Other Sources: we might receive information about you from other sources. Click here to see examples of the information we receive.

For What Purposes Does Amazon Europe Process Your Personal Information?

We process your personal information to operate, provide, and improve the Amazon Services that we offer our customers. These purposes include:

  • Purchase and delivery of products and services. We use your personal information to take and handle orders, deliver products and services, process payments, and communicate with you about orders, products and services, and promotional offers.
  • Provide, troubleshoot, and improve Amazon Services. We use your personal information to provide functionality, analyse performance, fix errors, and improve usability and effectiveness of the Amazon Services.
  • Recommendations and personalisation. We use your personal information to recommend features, products, and services that might be of interest to you, identify your preferences, and personalise your experience with Amazon Services.
  • Provide voice services. When you use our voice services, we process your voice input and other personal information to respond to your requests, provide the requested service to you, and improve Amazon Services. For more information about Alexa voice services click here
  • Comply with legal obligations. In certain cases, we have a legal obligation to collect and process your personal information. For instance, we collect from sellers information regarding place of establishment and bank account information for identity verification and other purposes.
  • Communicate with you. We use your personal information to communicate with you in relation to Amazon Services via different channels (e.g., by phone, email, chat).
  • Advertising. We use your personal information to display interest-based ads for features, products, and services that might be of interest to you. To learn more, please read our Interest-Based Ads notice.
  • Fraud Prevention and Credit Risks. We process personal information to prevent and detect fraud and abuse in order to protect the security of our customers, Amazon Europe, and others. We may also use scoring methods to assess and manage credit risks.
  • Purposes for which we seek your consent. We may also ask for your consent to process your personal information for a specific purpose that we communicate to you. When you consent to our processing your personal information for a specified purpose, you may withdraw your consent at any time and we will stop processing of your data for that purpose.

What About Cookies?

To enable our systems to recognise your browser or device and to provide Amazon Services to you, we use cookies. For more information about cookies and how we use them, please read our Cookies Notice.

Does Amazon Europe Share Your Personal Information?

Information about our customers is an important part of our business and we are not in the business of selling our customers' personal information to others. Amazon Europe shares customers' information only as described below and with Amazon.com, Inc. and the subsidiaries that Amazon.com, Inc. controls that are either subject to this Privacy Notice or follow practices at least as protective as those described in this Privacy Notice.

  • Transactions involving Third Parties: We make available to you services, products, applications, or skills provided by third parties for use on or through Amazon Services. For example, you can order products from third parties through our retail websites, download applications from third-party application providers from our App Store, and enable third-party skills through our Alexa services. We also offer services or sell product lines jointly with third-party businesses, such as co-branded credit cards. You can tell when a third party is involved in your transactions and we share customer information related to those transactions with that third party.
  • Third Party Service Providers: We employ other companies and individuals to perform functions on our behalf. Examples include fulfilling orders for products or services, delivering packages, sending postal mail and e-mail, removing repetitive information from customer lists, analysing data, providing marketing assistance, providing search results and links (including paid listings and links), processing payments, transmitting content, scoring credit risk, and providing customer service. These third-party service providers have access to personal information needed to perform their functions, but may not use it for other purposes. Further, they must process the personal information in accordance with this Privacy Notice and as permitted by applicable data protection laws.
  • Business Transfers: As we continue to develop our business, we might sell or buy other businesses or services. In such transactions, customer information generally is one of the transferred business assets but remains subject to the promises made in any pre-existing Privacy Notice (unless, of course, the customer consents otherwise). Also, in the unlikely event that Amazon.com, Inc. or substantially all of its assets are acquired, customer information will of course be one of the transferred assets.
  • Protection of Amazon Europe and Others: We release account and other personal information when we believe release is appropriate to comply with the law; enforce or apply our Conditions of Use and other agreements; or protect the rights, property or safety of Amazon Europe, our users or others. This includes exchanging information with other companies and organisations for fraud protection and credit risk reduction.
  • Other than as set out above, you will receive notice when personal information about you might be shared with third parties and you will have an opportunity to choose not to share the information.

Transfers out of the European Economic Area. Whenever we transfer personal information to countries outside of the European Economic Area in the course of sharing information as set out above, we will ensure that the information is transferred in accordance with this Privacy Notice and as permitted by the applicable laws on data protection.

How Secure is Information About Me?

We design our systems with your security and privacy in mind.

  • We work to protect the security of your information during transmission by using Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) software, which encrypts information you input.
  • We follow the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) when handling credit card data.
  • We maintain physical, electronic and procedural safeguards in connection with the collection, storage and disclosure of personal customer information. Our security procedures mean that we may occasionally request proof of identity before we disclose personal information to you.
  • Our devices offer security features to protect them against unauthorised access and loss of data. You can control these features and configure them based on your needs. Click here for more information on how to manage the security settings of your device.
  • It is important for you to protect against unauthorised access to your password and to your computers, devices, and applications. Be sure to sign off when you finish using a shared computer. For more information on how to sign off click here.

What About Third-Party Advertisers and Links to Other Websites?

Amazon Services may include third-party advertising and links to other websites and apps. Third party advertising partners may collect information about you when you interact with their content, advertising, and services. For more information about third-party advertising at Amazon Europe, including interest-based ads, please read our Interest-Based Ads notice. To adjust your advertising preferences, please go to the Advertising Preferences page.

What Information Can I Access?

You can access your information, including your name, address, payment options, profile information, Prime membership, household settings, and purchase history in the "Your Account" section of the website. Click here for a list of examples that you can access.

What Choices Do I Have?

If you have any questions or objection as to how we collect and process your personal information, please contact our Customer Service. Many of our Amazon Services also include settings that provide you with options as to how your information is being used.

  • As described above, you can choose not to provide certain information but then you might not be able to take advantage of many of the Amazon Services.
  • You can add or update certain information on pages such as those referenced in the Information You Can Access? section. When you update information, we usually keep a copy of the previous version for our records.
  • If you don't want to receive e-mail or other communications from us, please adjust your Customer Communication Preferences. If you don't want to receive in-app notifications from us, please adjust your notification settings in the app or your device.
  • If you don't want to see interest based-ads, please adjust your advertising preferences, please go to the Advertising Preferences page.
  • The Help feature on most browsers and devices will tell you how to prevent your browser or device from accepting new cookies, how to have the browser notify you when you receive a new cookie or how to disable cookies altogether. Because cookies allow you to take advantage of some essential Amazon Services, we recommend that you leave them turned on. For instance, if you block or otherwise reject our cookies, you will not be able to add items to your Shopping Basket, proceed to Checkout, or use any Amazon Services that require you to Sign in. For more information about cookies, see our Cookies Notice.
  • If you want to browse our websites anonymously, you may do so by logging out of your account here and disabling cookies on your browser.
  • When you consent to our processing your personal information for a specified purpose, you may withdraw your consent at any time and we will stop any further processing of your data for that purpose.
  • You will also be able to opt out of certain other types of data processing by updating your settings on the applicable Amazon website (e.g., in "Manage Your Content and Devices"), device, or application. For more information click here. Most non-Amazon devices also provide users with the ability to change device permissions (e.g., disable/access location services, contacts). For most devices, these controls are located in the device's settings menu. If you have questions about how to change your device permissions on devices manufactured by third parties, we recommend you contact your mobile service carrier or your device manufacturer as different devices may have different permission settings.
  • Sellers can add or update certain information in Seller Central, update their account information by accessing their Seller Account Information, and adjust the email or other communications they receive from us by updating their Notification Preferences.
  • Authors can add or update the information they have provided in the Author Portal and Author Central by accessing their accounts in the Author Portal and Author Central, respectively.

In addition, subject to applicable law, you have the right to request access to, correct, and delete your personal data, and to ask for data portability. You may also object to our processing of your personal data or ask that we restrict the processing of your personal data in certain instances. If you wish to do any of these things, please contact Customer Service

Are Children Allowed to Use Amazon Services?

Amazon Europe doesn't sell products for purchase by children. We sell children's products for purchase by adults. If you're under 18, you may use Amazon Services only with the involvement of a parent or guardian.

How Long Do We Keep Your Personal Information?

We keep your personal information to enable your continued use of Amazon Services, for as long as it is required in order to fulfil the relevant purposes described in this Privacy Notice, as may be required by law such as for tax and accounting purposes, or as otherwise communicated to you. For example, we retain your transaction history so that you can review past purchases (and repeat orders if desired) and what addresses you have shipped orders to, and to improve the relevancy of products and content we recommend.

Contacts, Notices & Revisions

If you have any concern about privacy at Amazon Europe or want to contact one of our data controllers, please contact us with a thorough description and we will try to resolve the issue for you. Further, the data protection officer for the above mentioned data controllers can be contacted at eu-privacy@amazon.co.uk. You can file a complaint with our principal supervisory authority, the Commission Nationale pour la Protection des Données in Luxembourg(external link), or with a local authority.

Our business changes constantly and our Privacy Notice will change also. You should check our website frequently to see recent changes. Unless stated otherwise, our current Privacy Notice applies to all information that we have about you and your account. We stand behind the promises we make, however, and will never materially change our policies and practices to make them less protective of customer information collected in the past without the consent of affected customers.

Related Practices & Information

Examples of Information Collected

Information You Give Us When You Use Amazon Services

You provide information to us when you:

  • search for products or services;
  • place an order through Amazon Services;
  • download, stream, view, or use content on a device, or through a service or application on a device;
  • provide information in Your Account (and you might have more than one if you have used more than one e-mail address or mobile number when shopping with us) or Your Profile;
  • talk to or otherwise interact with our Alexa Voice service;
  • upload your contacts;
  • configure your settings on, provide data access permissions for, or interact with your device or another Amazon Service;
  • provide information in your Seller Account, Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) account, Developer account or any other account we make available that allows you to develop or offer software, goods, or services to Amazon customers;
  • offer your products or services on or through Amazon Services;
  • communicate with us by phone, e-mail, or otherwise;
  • complete a questionnaire, a support ticket, or a contest entry form;
  • upload images, videos or other files to Prime Photos, Amazon Drive, or other Amazon Services;
  • compile Playlists, Watchlists, Wish Lists or gift registries;
  • Participate in community features, provide and rate Customer Reviews;
  • specify a Special Occasion Reminder; or
  • employ Product Availability Alerts, such as Available to Order Notifications.
As a result of those actions, you might supply us with such information as: your name; address and phone number; payment information; your age; your location information; people to whom purchases have been dispatched or people listed in 1-Click settings (including addresses and phone numbers); e-mail addresses of your friends and other people; content of reviews and e-mails to us; personal description and photograph in Your Profile; voice recordings when you speak to Alexa; images and video stored in connection with Amazon Services, information and documents regarding identity and standing; corporate and financial information; credit history information; VAT numbers; and device log files and configurations, including Wi-Fi credentials, if you choose to automatically synchronise them with your other Amazon devices.

Automatic Information

Examples of the information we collect and analyse include:

  • the Internet protocol (IP) address used to connect your computer to the Internet;
  • login; e-mail address; password;
  • the location of your device or computer;
  • content interaction information, such as content downloads, streams, and playback details including duration and number of simultaneous streams and downloads, and network details for streaming and download quality, including information about your internet service provider;
  • device metrics such as when a device is in use, application usage, connectivity data, and any errors or event failures;
  • Amazon Service metrics (e.g., the occurrences of technical errors, your interactions with service features and content, your settings preferences and backup information, location of your device running an application, information about uploaded images and files (e.g., file name, dates, times and location of your images));
  • purchase and content use history, which we sometimes aggregate with similar information from other customers to create features such as Best Sellers;
  • the full Uniform Resource Locators (URL) clickstream to, through and from our website (including date and time); cookie number; products and/ or content you viewed or searched for; page response times, download errors, length of visits to certain pages, page interaction information (such as scrolling, clicks, and mouse-overs),
  • phone numbers used to call our customer service number.
We may also use device identifiers, cookies, and other technologies on devices, applications and our web pages to collect browsing, usage or other technical information for fraud prevention purposes.

Information From Other Sources

Examples of information we receive from other sources include:

  • updated delivery and address information from our carriers or other third parties, which we use to correct our records and deliver your next purchase or communication more easily;
  • account information, purchase or redemption information and page-view information from some merchants with which we operate co-branded businesses or for which we provide technical, fulfillment, advertising or other services;
  • information about your interactions with products and services offered by our subsidiaries;
  • search results and links, including paid listings (such as Sponsored Links);
  • information about internet-connected devices and services that you've linked with Alexa; and
  • credit history information from credit bureaus, which we use to help prevent and detect fraud and to offer certain credit or financial services to some customers.

Information You Can Access

Examples of information you can access through Amazon Services include:

  • status of recent orders (including subscriptions);
  • your complete order history;
  • personally identifiable information (including name, e-mail, password, communications and personalised advertising preferences, address book and 1-Click settings);
  • payment settings (including payment card information and gift voucher, gift card and cheque balances);
  • e-mail notification settings (including Product Availability Alerts, Deliveries, Special Occasion Reminders, and newsletters);
  • recommendations and the products you recently viewed that are the basis for recommendations (including Recommended for You and Improve Your Recommendations);
  • shopping lists and gift registries (including Wish Lists and Baby and Wedding Registries);
  • your content, devices, services, and related settings;
  • content that you recently viewed;
  • voice recordings associated with your account;
  • Your Profile (including your product Reviews, Recommendations, Reminders and personal profile).
  • Sellers can access their account and other information, and adjust their communications preferences, by updating their accounts in Seller Central.
  • Authors can access their account and other information, and update their accounts, on the Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) or Author Central website, as applicable.
  • Developers participating in our Developer Services Program can access their account and other information, and adjust their communications preferences, by updating their accounts in the Developer Services Portal, developers.amazon.com.

EU-US and Swiss-US Privacy Shield

Amazon.com, Inc. and certain of its controlled US affiliates (together, the Amazon Group Companies, or "We") participate in the EU-US and Swiss-US Privacy Shield Frameworks regarding the collection, use, and retention of personal information from European Union member countries, the United Kingdom, and Switzerland. We have certified with the Department of Commerce that we adhere to the Privacy Shield Principles. To learn more about the Privacy Shield Principles, see here.

If you have any inquiries or complaints about our handling of your personal data under Privacy Shield, or about our privacy practices generally, please contact us at: privacyshield@amazon.com. We will respond to your inquiry promptly. If we are unable to satisfactorily resolve any complaint relating to the Privacy Shield, or if we fail to acknowledge your complaint in a timely fashion, you can submit your complaint to TRUSTe, which provides an independent third-party dispute resolution service based in the United States. TRUSTe has committed to respond to complaints and to provide appropriate recourse at no cost to you. To learn more about TRUSTe's dispute resolution services or to refer a complaint to TRUSTe, visit here. If neither Amazon nor TRUSTe resolves your complaint, you may pursue binding arbitration through the Privacy Shield Panel. To learn more about the Privacy Shield Panel, see here.

As explained here we sometimes provide personal information to third parties to perform services on our behalf. If we transfer personal information received under the Privacy Shield to a third party, the third party's access, use, and disclosure of the personal data must also be in compliance with our Privacy Shield obligations, and we will remain liable under the Privacy Shield for any failure to do so by the third party unless we prove we are not responsible for the event giving rise to the damage.

You can review our Privacy Shield registration here. The Amazon Group Companies are subject to the investigatory and enforcement powers of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). We may be required to disclose personal information that we handle under the Privacy Shield in response to lawful requests by public authorities, including to meet national security or law enforcement requirements.

Retrieved 08/07/2020 - Amazon.co.uk Privacy Notice