The Algorithm Sees You: How Amazon’s Profiling Page Became Viral for All the Wrong Reasons

By TechCrunch (Enriched and Expanded Edition)

It is no secret that e-commerce giants monitor our purchasing habits. Buy a pallet of cat litter, and the algorithm correctly surmises you own a feline. Stock up on anti-acne treatments, and targeted ads for skincare will inevitably follow. We live in an era where hyper-personalization is the baseline expectation of digital commerce.

Yet, there is a distinct psychological dissonance that occurs when the invisible machinery of big tech is laid bare. Seeing your personal habits, inferred lifestyle choices, and implicit assumptions converted into a tidy, convenient, and occasionally uncomfortably intimate bulleted list is jarring—even for the most digitally desensitized consumers.

That friction point between abstract data collection and hyper-specific reality recently launched an unsuspecting shopper into viral internet stardom, prompting millions of users to frantically comb through their own Amazon accounts to see what the retail behemoth really thinks of them.

Main Facts: The "Flat Buttocks" Revelation

The viral incident began when a Threads user, posting under the handle @fangirlinmegan, navigated to a hidden corner of her Amazon account settings—a section dedicated to tracking the retail giant’s assumptions about her life.

Alongside relatively standard behavioral metrics like "Shops from women’s departments" and "Probably owns a Shark robot vacuum," she stumbled upon an algorithmic deduction that left her utterly astounded: Amazon had formally concluded that she "has flat buttocks."

In a post that racked up over a million views in less than 24 hours, the user wrote:

"I stumbled upon a page of assumptions that Amazon has made about me based on my purchases and I’m literally speechless. I mean it ain’t wrong, but damn did you have to call me out like that?"

The startlingly blunt anatomical assessment quickly resonated across social media. While millions of internet users laughed at the sheer audacity of an automated server making physical value judgments, the underlying realization was far more profound: consumer data profiles are growing increasingly granular, transforming simple shopping carts into invasive digital psychological and physical portraits.

Chronology: From a Casual Scroll to a Viral Phenomenon

The trajectory of this digital privacy wake-up call unfolded rapidly across social platforms:

• The Discovery: User @fangirlinmegan explores her Amazon profile settings out of curiosity, encountering the "About You" preference panel.
• The Viral Post: Stunned by the specific algorithmic profile—highlighted by the "flat buttocks" tag—she shares screenshots on Meta’s Threads platform.
• The Explosion: Within hours, the post goes viral, drawing over one million views, thousands of shares, and widespread media attention as consumers realize this is a standardized feature accessible to anyone.
• The DIY Audit Wave: Legions of curious shoppers log into their desktop and mobile applications to unearth their own data profiles, sharing both mundane and bizarre algorithmic tags across X, TikTok, and Threads.
• The Retrospective Analysis: Tech journalists and privacy advocates begin unpacking the broader implications of how deep algorithmic profiling reaches into everyday consumer habits.

Supporting Data: What Amazon Thinks You Are

Curious about how the sausage is made? The data points Amazon stores about its users are compiled through a combination of explicit user input and implicit behavioral inference.

For those brave enough to look under the hood, navigating to this trove of data is relatively straightforward, though well-hidden within user settings menus.

How to Find Your Amazon "About You" Profile

• On Desktop:
  1. Hover over "Hello, [Your Name]" in the upper right-hand corner.
  2. Click "Account" under the "Your Account" heading.
  3. Locate the "Ordering and shopping preferences" section and click "Your Shopping preferences."
  4. Scroll to the bottom of the page and click the blue hyperlink reading "Manage your information."
• On Mobile App:
  1. Tap the hamburger icon (three horizontal lines) in the bottom menu bar.
  2. Navigate to Account > Shopping preferences > About you.

Once inside, users are greeted with a dashboard detailing everything the machine-learning models believe they know. For many, the results range from flattering to mundane. Tech journalists testing the feature found tags such as "practices photography," "plays collectible card games," "invested in the Apple ecosystem," and "reads diverse non-fiction." Other colleagues discovered nods toward interests in vinyl records, ceramics, natural home decor materials, and clothing optimized for comfort.

So, how did @fangirlinmegan end up with such a hyper-specific physical critique? Follow-up analysis pointed to a likely culprit: the recent purchase of "butt scrunch leggings"—a garment specifically designed to alter the perceived contour of the wearer’s lower body. The algorithm, processing the purchase of shapewear and activewear, made a blunt logistical leap.

Official Responses and Industry Context

While Amazon has not issued a formal, standalone press release addressing the viral "flat buttocks" meme, the functionality itself is a feature of the company’s broader Shopping Preferences architecture.

The stated intent of these data profiles is benign from a corporate perspective: to curate a better, more personalized shopping experience, streamline product recommendations, and deliver targeted advertising. E-commerce platforms argue that understanding whether a user prefers natural materials, uses Apple products, or buys pet supplies helps reduce friction in the digital marketplace, ensuring users find relevant goods faster.

However, the chasm between corporate intent and consumer perception remains vast. When data-driven personalization crosses the threshold from "helpful product suggestions" into unsolicited physical diagnoses, it crosses a psychological line. It transforms a shopping assistant into an uncomfortably observant digital houseguest.

Implications: The Creep of Ubiquitous Surveillance

The viral reaction to Amazon’s profiling exposes a deeper societal unease regarding modern data collection. In a digital ecosystem defined by ubiquitous mass surveillance—ranging from automated license plate readers and transit tracking to cross-site cookie harvesting and location data brokers—the average consumer feels increasingly stripped of digital privacy.

The fact that an online bookstore-turned-everything-store can infer physical traits based on textile purchases highlights the sheer predictive power of modern machine learning. Algorithms do not need to "see" you to profile you; they simply need to aggregate your transaction history, search queries, clickstream data, and dwell times.

While discovering that an AI thinks you have flat buttocks makes for good viral comedy, it serves as a stark reminder of the digital dossiers being compiled on billions of people every second of every day. We live in an age of inescapable data accumulation. At the very least, as millions of users confirmed this week, you can log in, check your digital rap sheet, and find out exactly what the machine thinks of you—even if the truth hurts.

About the Author:
Amanda Silberling is a senior writer at TechCrunch covering the intersection of technology and culture. She co-hosts "Wow If True," a podcast about internet culture. When she isn’t investigating algorithmic quirks, she writes extensively about digital privacy, internet subcultures, and the social impacts of modern tech.