Technologies

Were You ‘Tricked’ Into an Amazon Prime Subscription? You Might Be Owed Part of a $2.5B Settlement

Consumers who were «tricked» into a Prime subscription and unable to cancel could see a payout. Here’s who qualifies, and how much you might receive.

Amazon used to make it easy to sign up for a Prime subscription — but very difficult to cancel. From tricky shipping options to Prime Video, plenty of customers wound up with a subscription they didn’t want, and now Amazon is paying the price. In September, the US Federal Trade Commission dropped a massive $2.5 billion settlement on the company for its deceptive subscription tactics.

This isn’t just a slap on the wrist. A whopping $1.5 billion is earmarked to refund eligible subscribers, with the rest serving as a civil penalty. Amazon is now legally required to provide a clear, obvious option to decline Prime, making it as easy to leave the service as it is to join.

Amazon isn’t admitting to any shady behavior. «Amazon and our executives have always followed the law, and this settlement allows us to move forward and focus on innovating for customers,» Mark Blafkin, Amazon senior manager, said in a statement. «We work incredibly hard to make it clear and simple for customers to both sign up or cancel their Prime membership, and to offer substantial value for our many millions of loyal Prime members around the world.»

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Why did the FTC file a lawsuit against Amazon?

The FTC filed suit against Amazon, accusing the company of using «dark patterns» to nudge people into Prime subscriptions and then making it too hard to cancel. The FTC maintained Amazon was in violation of Section 5 of the FTC Act and the Restore Online Shoppers’ Confidence Act.

«Specifically, Amazon used manipulative, coercive or deceptive user-interface designs known as ‘dark patterns’ to trick consumers into enrolling in automatically renewing Prime subscriptions,» the FTC complaint stated.

Who’s eligible for Amazon’s payout?

Amazon’s legal settlement is limited to customers who enrolled in Amazon Prime between June 23, 2019, and June 23, 2025. It’s also restricted to customers who subscribed to Prime using a «challenged enrollment flow» or who enrolled in Prime through any method but were unsuccessful in canceling their memberships.

The FTC called out specific enrollment pages, including Prime Video enrollment, the Universal Prime Decision page, the Shipping Option Select page and the Single Page Checkout. To qualify for a payout, claimants must also not have used more than 10 Amazon Prime benefits in any 12-month period.

Customers who signed up via those challenged processes and did not use more than three Prime benefits within one year will be paid automatically by Amazon within 90 days. Other eligible Amazon customers will need to file a claim, after Dec. 23, and Amazon is required to send notices to those people within 30 days of making its automatic payments.

Customers who did not use a challenged sign-up process but instead were unable to cancel their memberships will also need to file claims for payment.

How big will the Amazon payments be?

Payouts to eligible Amazon claimants will be limited to a maximum of $51. That amount could be reduced depending on the number of Amazon Prime benefits you used while subscribed to the service. Those benefits include free two-day shipping, watching shows or movies on Prime Video or Whole Foods grocery discounts.

Customers who qualify for the payments should receive them by Dec. 24.Customers outside the US aren’t eligible for the payout.

Technologies

A Hacker Threat Is Hiding in Your Car’s Tire Pressure System

A new study reveals that a car’s tire pressure monitoring system can be easily accessed by hackers.

Technologies

Today’s NYT Mini Crossword Answers for Friday, Feb. 27

Here are the answers for The New York Times Mini Crossword for Feb. 27.

Looking for the most recent Mini Crossword answer? Click here for today’s Mini Crossword hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Wordle, Strands, Connections and Connections: Sports Edition puzzles.

Was today’s Mini Crossword too short for you? The New York Times now has a Midi Crossword, which is not as big as the original NYT Crossword, but longer than the Mini. Read on for the answers to today’s Mini Crossword. And if you could use some hints and guidance for daily solving, check out our Mini Crossword tips.

If you’re looking for today’s Wordle, Connections, Connections: Sports Edition and Strands answers, you can visit CNET’s NYT puzzle hints page.

Read more: Tips and Tricks for Solving The New York Times Mini Crossword

Let’s get to those Mini Crossword clues and answers.

Mini across clues and answers

1A clue: Lacking locks
Answer: BALD

5A clue: One of the Great Lakes
Answer: ERIE

6A clue: Movie with the fake newspaper headline «Wonder Elephant Soars to Fame!»
Answer: DUMBO

8A clue: Live tweeter?
Answer: BIRD

9A clue: The slightest bit
Answer: ATAD

Mini down clues and answers

1D clue: Hard thing to leave on a cold day
Answer: BED

2D clue: Caribbean island northwest of Curaçao
Answer: ARUBA

3D clue: The sky, in a saying
Answer: LIMIT

4D clue: Actress Messing
Answer: DEBRA

7D clue: Like this clue number
Answer: ODD

Technologies

Smartphone Sales to Plummet 13% in 2026 Due to RAM Crisis, Says IDC

AI-fueled memory scarcity is hitting the phone market hard this year, particularly for inexpensive, low-end devices.

The projected shortage of memory chips worldwide will have a more serious impact on smartphone sales in 2026 than previously projected, according to new data from International Data Corporation Worldwide. Whereas the company just in November had estimated a drop of between 0.9% and 5.2% (the latter being its «pessimistic scenario»), now it sees a 12.9% decline this year, based on its Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker.

«What we are witnessing is not a temporary squeeze, but a tsunami-like shock originating in the memory supply chain, with ripple effects spreading across the entire consumer electronics industry,» Francisco Jeronimo, vice president for Worldwide Client Devices at IDC, said in a statement.

The hardest-hit companies are expected to be those selling to the lower end of the market, which can’t absorb the higher component costs while maintaining profitable margins. As a result, Jeronimo says, many of those players will pass the added costs on to consumers.

That also includes regional markets like the Middle East and Africa that sell mostly inexpensive smartphones, which could see a steep 20.6% drop year-over-year.

By contrast, IDC expects Apple and Samsung to be better able to withstand the crisis. «As smaller and low-end-positioned Android vendors struggle with rising costs, Apple and Samsung could not only weather the storm but potentially expand market share as the competitive landscape tightens,» said Jeronimo.

Memory has become scarce due to the insatiable demand to feed generative AI. Essentially all of the memory set to be manufactured this year is already earmarked. What started as a demand for graphics processors has expanded to other components. For example, hard drive manufacturer Western Digital announced in early February that it had already sold out of its supply for 2026.

«We expect consolidation as smaller players exit, and low-end vendors face sharp shipment declines amid supply constraints and lower demand at higher price points,» said Nabila Popal, senior research director at IDC, projecting a 14% rise in the average selling price of smartphones to $523.

Popal expects memory prices to stabilize by the middle of 2027, but doesn’t see them coming down to earlier levels. The sub-$100 segment, made up of approximately 171 million devices, will be «permanently uneconomical,» she said. «In short, there is no return to business as usual for vendors and consumers.»