As US cities are gripped by riots over the death of George Floyd, someone has apparently decided to move racial tensions online, replacing some product images with banners featuring racist abuse on Amazon’s UK website.
Users started to realize that something was wrong with the online shopping platform as they tried to search for Apple’s popular earbuds. As they typed ‘Airpods’ on Amazon, they found that pictures of some products were displaying racist messages.
Many took to Twitter to share screenshots and videos, expressing their fury over what they found.
Surely Amazon can remove these items from their site in minutes. They’re still on Amazon UK. Extraordinarily poor site administration. There are some seriously sick ppl out there. #amazon#airpodspic.twitter.com/jKXNpbyvlS
Hi @amazon, due to the emotional distress your website has caused me, I’ll take 5 pairs of Apple Airpods second generation. Thank you ? pic.twitter.com/wDmFvvpOf9
Despite users demanding that Amazon make a statement over the incident, the company has not issued any official explanation so far. It told Reuters that some “bad actor” was to blame for the images in question, which it is currently deleting.
It is still not clear how the banners got onto the website, but some suspect that there may have been a security breach.
The rant comes as violent riots emerged in several major cities across the US. Protesters are demanding justice for Minnesotan George Floyd, an unarmed black man who died during an arrest attempt by a white officer earlier this week.
For more stories on economy & finance visit RT’s business section
