Jeff Bezos, founder and chief executive officer of Amazon.com Inc., listens during an Economic Club of Washington discussion in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 13, 2018.Photographer: Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg

Amazon founder and chief executive officer Jeff Bezos has alleged American Media Inc., which owns the National Enquirer, attempted to extort him by threatening to release personal photos unless he dropped an investigation of the company.

Bezos published an alleged exchange with AMI's deputy general counsel Jon Fine in a blog post on Medium on Thursday afternoon. Fine previously worked at Amazon, spending nine years at the company, including nearly than two years as associate general counsel, according to his LinkedIn profile.

Fine allegedly emailed Bezos on Feb. 6. In the email, Fine said AMI demanded that Bezos release all claims he and AMI have had against each other. He also requested that Bezos, who owns the Washington Post, release a public, mutually agreed upon statement saying he has no knowledge of AMI's coverage being politically motivated. In exchange, AMI would not publish personal photos of Bezos, including selfies sent to his alleged girlfriend.

If either side broke the agreement, Fine said AMI could publish the photos. The National Enquirer had previously published personal texts between Bezos and his alleged girlfriend Lauren Sanchez. Bezos hired investigators to learn how AMI obtained the texts. Last month, Bezos and his wife announced they would divorce after 25 years of marriage.

“These communications cement AMI's long-earned reputation for weaponizing journalistic privileges, hiding behind important protections, and ignoring the tenets and purpose of true journalism,” Bezos said in his Medium post Thursday. “Of course I don't want personal photos published, but I also won't participate in their well-known practice of blackmail, political favors, political attacks, and corruption. I prefer to stand up, roll this log over, and see what crawls out.”

Fine joined AMI in November, following the departure of the New York-based company's longtime general counsel Cameron Stracher. He previously served as the general counsel of OptiQly and held in-house roles at Amazon, Random House and NBC.

AMI released a statement on the allegations Friday morning.

“American Media believes fervently that it acted lawfully in the reporting of the story of Mr. Bezos. Further, at the time of the recent allegations made by Mr. Bezos, it was in good faith negotiations to resolve all matters with him,” the statement read. “Nonetheless, in light of the nature of the allegations published by Mr. Bezos, the Board has convened and determined that it should promptly and thoroughly investigate the claims. Upon completion of that investigation, the Board will take whatever appropriate action is necessary.”

Fine and Amazon did not immediately respond to request for comment.

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