While some objections have addressed public-facing symbols and names, others have called attention to unintentional hidden messages or scrutinised designs that could be camouflaging or suggesting violent Nazi imagery.

In 2013, a J.C. Penney billboard was removed in California after some saw Hitler’s likeness in a tea kettle featured on it. Last year, Facebook removed advertisements on its platform that the Trump campaign bought that prominently featured a red triangle, a symbol used by Nazis to classify political prisoners.

At last week’s Conservative Political Action Conference, some viewers said the stage was shaped like a rune appropriated as a hate symbol by the Nazis. The organisation dismissed the assertion.

‘Visual and functional updates’

On Twitter, images of the Amazon app’s logo change were widely shared, in many languages, and reported by multiple news organisations outside the United States. In Germany, where reproductions of Nazi symbols are banned, the news of the Amazon logo change was covered in technology publications.

“Of course you can see Adolf Hitler everywhere, if you want,” Thomas Cloer, a journalist, said on Twitter.

The Anti-Defamation League’s chief executive, Jonathan Greenblatt, said Nazi symbols could become mainstreamed as they spread, especially by people who do not have a full understanding of their meaning.

The league, which curates an online database of hate symbols, has previously called attention to other examples, as when Zara sold a striped shirt with a six-pointed yellow Star of David, and H&M advertised a black child wearing a sweatshirt that said “Coolest monkey in the jungle”.

“It is always important for people to speak up when they see patterns in advertising or in design that could potentially be offensive,” Greenblatt said. “While in many cases these are unintentional, people are rightfully sensitive to these issues because of the history and the use of symbolism by racists and anti-Semites from the Nazis to the present white supremacist movement.”

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Alaimo said it appeared Amazon did not anticipate that people would see Hitler references and that it had moved quickly to address the concerns.

In its emailed statement on Wednesday, Amazon said the new app icon “follows recent visual and functional updates”. It was launched on iOS in Britain, Spain, Italy and the Netherlands on January 25; worldwide on iOS on February 22; and on Android on March 1.

The New York Times