Bezos Vs. Bezos: Amazon Files Lawsuit Related To Washington Post In Major Conflict Of Interest For Billionaire

Billionaire Jeff Bezos appears to have a major conflict of interest on his hands with a newspaper he owns trying to get records from another company he founded.

What Happened: While he's no longer the CEO of Amazon.com Inc AMZN, Bezos remains a shareholder and the executive chairman of the company.

This means that a lawsuit filed by Amazon against the Washington Post, which Bezos owns, now has the billionaire on both sides of the legal fight.

The Washington Post is trying to obtain records related to Amazon's Project Kuiper satellite business, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

Amazon is fighting back and has sued to block the records request as the e-commerce company states releasing the information could be harmful as it contains trade secrets.

The report says items requested by the news outlet include inspection records, investigation notes and complaints related to visits to the company by the Washington Department of Labor and Industries.

Amazon says the records contain proprietary satellite designs and other information that could give competitors "a competitive edge."

Amazon has not sued the newspaper directly, instead filing a lawsuit against a Washington state agency that agreed to disclose the records. The company is not seeking to block the release of all of the requested records, only a small portion that it believes contains trade secrets.

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Why It's Important: The news of the battle by The Washington Post against Amazon comes as the newspaper faces public pushback after not endorsing a candidate for president for the first time since 1988.

The decision was said to have been made by Bezos, who bought the newspaper in 2013. The move led to the exit of several newspaper workers and saw around 250,000 subscribers cancel their subscriptions as a result.

The battle between The Washington Post and Amazon and the outcome could become a storyline for Bezos and whether or not billionaires should own news outlets.

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