Motorola App Allegedly Hijacks Amazon App Activity to Insert Affiliate Referral Codes

Motorola is facing scrutiny after researchers and users discovered that its preinstalled Smart Feed app was silently hijacking launches of the Amazon Shopping app to inject affiliate referral codes into user traffic.

The behavior, now disabled after public backlash, raises fresh concerns about trust, bloatware, and on‑device ad tech on premium Android phones.

Motorola Smart Feed Caught Rewriting Amazon Launches

A report from a Motorola Razr 60 Ultra user on Reddit emerged after a Motorola Razr owner noticed that opening the Amazon Shopping app from the app drawer briefly launched a browser and navigated to a suspicious URL before handing control back to Amazon.

Packet captures showed repeated requests to devicenative.com, an advertising and tracking service described as affiliated with Motorola’s on‑device personalization stack. From there, traffic was routed through domains such as kira-abboud.com, which then redirected to Amazon with an affiliate ID attached to the URL.

Multiple outlets and independent testers reproduced the issue on recent Razr and Edge devices running updated versions of the Smart Feed app.

The hijack only appeared to trigger when Amazon was launched from the app drawer or via Smart Feed; launching the same app from a home screen shortcut behaved normally, making the redirection easy to miss.

In effect, Smart Feed was intercepting an app launch intent and forcing it through a monetized web tracking path without clear disclosure or consent.

The redirect chain added an Amazon affiliate code that appears to be associated with a fashion influencer. However, it doesn’t match the codes used in the influencer’s published links.

This suggests a third party was configured to receive commission on purchases made by Motorola users, despite having no direct relationship with the transaction or the phone owner. While affiliate tagging is common in links shared via websites and social media, silently inserting referral IDs into native app launches crosses a line into deceptive growth tactics.

In statements to the media, Motorola acknowledged the behavior. It characterized it as the result of a misconfigured “app search and suggestion experience” developed with Device Native.

The company says routing Amazon launches through a tracking link was “unintended” and that it has now corrected the configuration on affected devices. According to testers, recent updates have stopped the redirect, with Amazon now launching directly again.

Even if now fixed, the incident underscores how preinstalled system apps can quietly morph into adware‑like components when tied to third‑party monetization platforms.

Because Smart Feed ships as a hidden or hard‑to‑remove system component on many Motorola phones, users had limited visibility into its capabilities and almost no meaningful control until the controversy surfaced.

Security researchers warn that similar “experience” layers, search overlays, feed widgets, and launchers are increasingly being used as privileged points to inject tracking or affiliate logic into otherwise legitimate app flows.

On affected Motorola devices, users reported that disabling Smart Feed in Settings immediately stopped the hijack behavior. Some more advanced users went further, using ADB‑based tools such as Shizuku‑backed debloaters to uninstall the component entirely.

For now, the episode serves as a reminder that even reputable OEMs can blur the line between “smart experiences” and stealth monetization, leaving privacy‑conscious users to audit system behavior the hard way.

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