AMAZON was criticised today for being slow to react to remove racist abuse that appeared across multiple listings on the British section of its website.

The online retailer blamed a “bad actor” after popular products, including Apple AirPods and bluetooth headphones, were posted featuring racial slurs.

Shoppers found that listings had replaced the product's image with an abusive message that contained several uses of the N-word.

“We are removing the images in question and have taken action on the bad actor,” an Amazon spokeswoman said.

The offending comments have since been removed but the company was criticised as they were still on its site in the early hours of yesterday morning.

One Twitter user said: “They’re still on Amazon UK. Extraordinarily poor site administration.”

Another posted: “I was looking into buying some airpods and I found some racist slur instead. I’m actually offended.”

Amazon owner Jeff Bezos is the richest man in the world with a wealth of $113 billion (£101bn).

The company’s net sales increased by 26 per cent to £61.2bn in the first quarter as more people used the site to buy products during the coronavirus lockdown.