digital life?

Consumer protection is decades behind - that is about to change

Created: 2022-12-13Updated: 2022-12-13, 1:46 p.m

By: Patrick Freiwah

Robot serves customers of an electronics store: Consumer protection in Germany is not yet fit for the digital age (symbol image).

© Andreas Friedrichs/Imago

Product liability regulations are almost 40 years old.

That should finally change.

Consumer protection should adapt to the digital age.

Berlin/Munich - Modern, digital life often presents consumers with difficulties and challenges.

Electronics in particular - and there are now a lot of them in households - can often only be understood with a great deal of time.

Cell phones and other devices have features that many people never explore or use.

Defective products in particular can cause trouble, which buyers then have to deal with.

Long overdue, but so far neglected by the legislature: consumer advice centers are demanding more protection in liability law.

According to Ramona Pop, head of the federal association, consumers have almost no chance of proving product defects and causalities.

Devices that can be digitally networked in particular are an opaque “black box” for many people.

The burden of proof must therefore be reversed in principle, Pop demands from the German Press Agency (dpa).

Consumer protection: Reform of product liability law urgently needed

This must lie with the manufacturers if the users use it as intended.

After all, the companies know their products better and can demonstrate that there is no error.

This could apply, for example, to damage caused by digitally programmable roller shutters.

According to the association, a fundamental reform of product liability law is necessary in order to adapt the applicable rules to the digital age.

In this context, there is criticism of the EU Commission: Because they missed this opportunity with a draft presented in autumn 2022.

Consumer advocates also demand that operators of online marketplaces also be held liable for defective items if the person responsible for the product is not available.

However, the Federal Association of Consumers welcomes the Commission's proposal that claims can not only be asserted when the damage reaches a threshold of 500 euros - but from the first euro.

A clarification that software is a product and is therefore subject to product liability law is also positive.

The termination options on websites are often inadequate, according to consumer advice centers:

Consumer protection lags several decades behind the digital age

At the end of September, the Commission of the European Union submitted proposals to modernize the almost 40-year-old provisions on product liability.

The renewal is aimed in particular at products that are operated with artificial intelligence (AI).

Because within just a few decades, the product range has grown enormously in the course of digitization.

Technologies such as drones, for example, can only work if consumers feel safe with them, according to experts.

In the next step, the Commission's proposal from Brussels must be approved by the European Parliament and the individual EU states.