Toy Industries of Europe (TIE), the voice of reputable toy manufacturers in Europe, regrets the European Parliament (EP) Internal Market & Consumer Protection (IMCO) Committee’s conclusions on the Digital Services Act (DSA). The Committee chose not to use this opportunity to take a significant leap forward in terms of protection of EU consumers and the fight against illegal toys.
The Committee decided to:
- Not make sure toys sold online by non-EU sellers can be held to the same standards as toys from EU traders. We have the world’s strictest toy safety requirements but they will not be applied to many products.
- Not allow brands to obtain the status of ‘trusted flagger’ to help take down (often dangerous) fakes of their products. This means it will be up to the consumer to make the choice between real / fake for their child, often not realising they are making that choice. It is a step backwards from today’s practices in the fight against counterfeits sold online.
- Not move beyond traditional marketplaces for traceability requirements. This means sellers of dangerous toys sold through online adds or via new trends like livestream shopping can remain untraceable. The DSA is not future-proof in this respect.
- Not to make the liability exemption for online platforms conditional to their fulfilling their obligations. Without this ‘earn your exemption’ requirement, the DSA has no teeth, it is a very weak instrument.
This is a huge disappointment and will seriously damage the value of the DSA and its future-proof ambition as the EU’s landmark digital legislation. Therefore, we call on the EP plenary to correct this by voting in the interest of European consumers and European business in January.
We call on the EP plenary to:
- Ensure the world’s strictest toy safety requirements CAN be applied to all products, also when sold by non-EU sellers. This can be corrected in Article 22
- Ensure brands can play a meaningful part in the swift takedown of (often dangerous) fakes. Paragraph 2b of Article 19 should therefore be deleted.
- Ensure all online traders should be traceable, by broadening the scope of Article 22.
- Ensure the liability exemption needs to be ‘earned’. This element can be introduced in Article 5
For more information, see:
- ‘Joint call by business, consumer and civil society organisations on the Digital Services Act (DSA): Effective and unambiguous rules are needed to tackle illegal activities and rogue traders’
- Joint letter: ‘DSA’s “Trusted Flaggers” provisions must reinforce the standards that exist today’
