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Banned By Amazon: Tech Products It Won’t Touch

There are guidelines to what third-party sellers can and can’t sell on Amazon, but when it comes to tech products, the No. 1 e-tailer is pretty explicit.

Listed on a “Selling at Amazon.com” page is a wide range of prohibited items. Some can be dangerous, like laser pens and pointers; others annoying, such as non-compliant USB Type-C cables; and most are straight out illegal, like stolen cellphones, GPS jammers and cable TV de-scramblers.

But there’s a fourth category buried all the way at the bottom: media players from Apple and Google, including Apple TV, Chromecast, Chromecast Audio and the Nexus Player, that are off limits to Amazon’s ecosystem. As the e-tailer explains it:

“In recent years, Prime Video has become an important part of Prime, so to avoid customer confusion, it’s important that the streaming media players we sell interact well with Prime Video.”

Emphasis ours. Here’s the entire list:

Examples of Prohibited Listings

*Products intended to affect traffic signals

*Products where the serial number has been removed or altered

*Power amplifiers used with CB radios

*Products designed to intentionally block, jam or interfere with licensed or authorized radio communications, such as:

*Cell jammers
*GPS jammers
*Laser jammers
*PCS jammers
*Radar jammers
*Wi-Fi jammers
*Radar shifters

*Products that descramble — or gain access to — cable or satellite television without permission, such as:

*Blocker devices
*Hardware or Software DSS Emulators
*Listings for information or guides on “how to” descramble cable or satellite television without permission
*Programmed Smart Cards
*Smart Card programmers and unloopers

*Portable, handheld laser products, such as:

*Lasers pointers
*Laser flares
*Laser pens
*Presentation remotes that integrate laser pointers
*Stylus pens with integrated laser pointers
*Pet toy laser pointers and similar products

*Products that incorporate Class IIIB lasers (such as laser light show projectors) and Class IV lasers (such as industrial lasers)

*Video game controllers (including cards or other devices) that replace existing technology in a video game

*DVD duplicators that bypass copyright protections

*Blu-ray players that have been modified to disable region coding

*Any cellphone that was originally locked to a cellphone carrier and has been manually unlocked to work with other carriers (such as jailbroken iPhones, unlock codes for BlackBerry)

*Cellphone unlocking devices

*Cellphones with bad electronic serial numbers (ESNs)

*Micro SIM cards modified from standard size SIM cards

*Wireless microphones and similar devices that operate in a 700 MHz broadcast band

*Any holiday light and/or decorative outfit product that is not compliant with 80 FR 25216

*Any extension cord product that is not compliant with the UL 817 standard

*Certain streaming media players, listed here. In recent years, Prime Video has become an important part of Prime, so to avoid customer confusion, it’s important that the streaming media players we sell interact well with Prime Video.

           *Any USB-C (or USB Type-C) cable or adapter product that is not compliant with standard specifications issued by “USB Implementers Forum Inc.”

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