EU Commission finds Temu in breach of online platform rules

https://www.euronews.com/next/2025/07/28/eu-commission-finds-temu-in-breach-of-online-platform-rules

by saubeidl • 12 months ago

68 89 12 months ago

euronews.com

pjc506• 12 months ago

One to bear in mind when people say that the online platform rules are anti-American.

oblio• 12 months ago

Oh, don't worry, this will be rephrased as "it impedes Americans, too, so it's anti American".

Despite the fact that the US is doing the exact same thing to other economies, especially China.

China has great networking equipment, but it can't be sold in the US. China has great smartphone brands, those can't be sold, either. Chinese electric cars, same.

China obviously is the OG regarding impeding or outright blocking competition with the 51% joint ventures.

Of course it's also protectionism, everyone is doing it.

However where I hear crickets is the actual public benefit/moral angle:

Just because foreign companies that absolutely dominate these markets are the ones being fined the most, does that mean that the ideas behind the fines are wrong?

Working for US companies operating in Europe, I would say that they (and probably Chinese companies - from what I hear) are natural targets: "move fast and break things", everything is US derived in spirit and in action and Europe doesn't work like that (the US is basically: you're smart and/or privileged and you get a decent or great life, if you're neither of those things, go live under a bridge).

Can't both do a lot of gray area stuff to grow unicorns and also not expect to be punished for breaking lots of social eggs.

0xy2• 12 months ago

Notably does not include application of the DMA, which applies exclusively to US tech and Euro tech is excluded by wordsmithed carve-outs.

jeppester2• 12 months ago

Euro tech is excluded by wordsmithed carve-outs.

How so?

dotandgtfo2• 12 months ago

Thanks to some frankly amazing American propaganda there's a surge of interest in free speech in Europe. Funnily the same regulations that aim to remove toxic products, make platforms more transparent, and hold platforms more accountable for breaking the law all are being attacked for encroaching on free speech.

I don't see it succeeding.

It's hard to explain just how much shit these digital platforms pull when serving a small market they don't care much about. People are rightfully pissed. It's seeped deeply into the public sphere the last ~8 years. Much more than I imagined possible even 2-3 years ago. Doubly so with the recent merging of the Republican party and technology leaders.

While Temu is in a class of its own - it's obvious that hyperscaling and postponing QC, moderation and compliance with a very American approach to safe harbour laws will not continue being the premier way to skirt laws for much longer.

mytailorisrich10• 12 months ago

Funnily the same regulations that aim to remove toxic products, make platforms more transparent, and hold platforms more accountable for breaking the law all are being attacked for encroaching on free speech.

That's what a clever law looks like, it bundles things together.

So now if someone complains about threats to free speech they can be told "Oh so you prefer toxic products, then? Think of the children!" in the same way you are doing.

dotandgtfo2• 12 months ago

That would make more sense if the law was limiting speech. But it has been clearly designed to not give governments the power to remove content/services/products that are not illegal.

Content which is not directly illegal is covered by the voluntary code of conduct on disinformation [1]. If you can point out to me a provision which allows the governments to force platforms to remove content which is not explicitly illegal I'll be very impressed. Because it ain't there.

It does say that algorithms should be tweaked to not spread "damaging disinformation" - e.g. reduce amplification of it. And it does say that these platforms shouldn't be allowing users who create disinformation to monetize their content like the good old Macedonian troll farms [2]

But in the end - there are no sanctions. These are guidelines. And if platforms consistently ignore these and it turns into a systemic harm then fines can start piling up. But never for a single piece of content - just a systemic malpractice.

Yes. It's a clever law because it doesn't give governments the power to remove content which is not illegal. But it does still force platforms to do something about their incentives they create for third-parties around content.

And no. Throwing the baby out with the bathwater and letting foreign companies self-regulate illegal content is frankly ludicrous considering their stellar track record of not giving a shit because it's the cheapest option.

[1] https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/library/code-conduc...

[2] https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/ps-political-science...

fxtentacle11• 12 months ago

One big factor that I observe in Germany is that the general public has stopped trusting what American companies say. For example, when you contact the Amazon support, they will try very hard to gaslight you into believing that your consumer protection only lasts for 30 days. But by now mainstream media is reporting about it that they’re just lying to your face. And, indeed, casually mentioning the correct law immediately extends your warranty to the full (legally required) two years.

I fully agree with you, by now no new company will grow that large using this American approach, because nowadays the German public will expect them to skirt the law and call them out on it immediately.

pjc506• 12 months ago

Meanwhile the free speech debate rages on over itch.io versus the two giant US payments firms under pressure from an Australian group.

shivasaxena14• 12 months ago

I work for a Swiss POS firm. We buy all our peripherals like tablet stands etc, and merchandising from Temu since it's 5-10x time cheaper and is same or better quality. We are competing with well funded companies like lighspeed/toast so it's been great help for us.

Funny incident our CEO just mentioned to me yesterday: She ordered stickers from a local shop without asking the price, and on delivery had to pay 200 CHF for 20 stickers so 10 CHF/sticker. Next time she ordered from temu and got them at 20 CHF for 200 stickers so 0.1 CHF/sticker.

At least to me it's clear this is plain and simple regulatory capture by inefficient european retailers. In supermarkets I have to pay 12 EUR for a bottle opener that I can get for 2 EUR on temu. Amazon.de for example launched free delivery to estonia and other small european countries only recently post rise of temu.

These actions by EU commision are vehemently anti-consumer and anti-business under the transparent guise of being pro-consumer and pro-business.

Would recommend Bill Gurly's talk about regulatory capture if anyone is interested https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=F9cO3-MLHOM

fxtentacle11• 12 months ago

It’s all great to buy cheap stuff until you notice that those stickers are poisonous, your hand soap causes cancer and the Wi-Fi broke down because cheap uncertified electronics are causing interference all over your building.

As someone living in the EU, I am happy that we have product safety regulations which are halfway reasonable. But as someone building hardware in the EU, I sure sometimes hope that I would be allowed to just skip all the environmental, safety, tax, and EMI rules. But that’s the price we have to pay so that we don’t accidentally get poisoned due to other people’s greed.

And that’s why, even though it negatively affects my business, I fully support those EU regulations.

mytailorisrich10• 12 months ago

True but bear in mind that most of those things are made in China whether you buy them here or on Temu, or Amazon and may even be the same product from the same factory.

Platforms like Temu allow you to buy essentially direct from China and to cut many middlemen.

In hardware you have state-of-the-art PCB and assembly providers in China, who don't "skip" anything compared to European ones. Of course you have bad apples, too.

So there is a balance between paying more for quality and subsidising inefficiency and middlemen.

shivasaxena14• 12 months ago

Yes, disguising this regulatory capture as a concern for consumers on health and safety grounds is a great digression. I have also seen people raise concern about Slave labour for example.

This of course ignores the fact that European retailers often sell the same exact goods from the same Chinese factory, but at a 5-10x markup. And as said these goods are often same of better quality that what I would get from domestic retailers. In case of stickers the one from Temu were were of higher quality.

If EU was forcing Temu to abide by EU regulations on health and safety I would be all for it. But they are shutting down competition(change in customs rule on small packages etc) so our domestic retailers can stay inefficient and continue to bleed consumers.

tialaramex2• 12 months ago

As someone building hardware, unless it's like medical implants or aeroplanes or something you'll be aware that the E marking is self-certified for most things. You could (it may not be cheaper, depending on industry and volume) do the work to check you're obeying these rules and affix your own certifications.

That's not true for a pacemaker or a jetliner, which will both need somebody else to certify them before they can be sold for purpose, but it is true if you make most ordinary "hardware".

The rationale is that most people don't want to make shoddy garbage and so they actually want to know what's expected of them and comply, and those who are maybe less than honest can be caught by the usual processes - after the fact admittedly but now they're guilty not of some hard to prove negligence or whatever but of specifically selling goods which wrongly claimed to meet the requirements.

My mother used to (decades ago) make stuffed animals for kids. Those needed E marks. One day a mother complained that her child had been injured by a toy, investigators show up, take similar animals for testing and... they're fine because of course they're fine mum had been following the EU self-certification process, testing materials, using proper tools etc. and so she knew it was done properly albeit in this particular case that wasn't enough - without any certification framework my guess is that's a nasty lawsuit and almost nothing she can do to defend herself.

kmac_• 12 months ago

Thank you for your comment. People would be shocked at how many hazards they avoid because of those regulations. I'll defend China here a bit, as they are improving (at the cost of competing with other, less regulated countries, the irony). And the cherry on top: those "cheap" items are heavily subsidized from multiple places, including postal fees. When the local production gets extinguished (and it won't come back easily, as "know-how" people will be retired) those prices will change.

input_sh• 12 months ago

I invite you to look at the linked PDF (https://www.beuc.eu/sites/default/files/publications/BEUC-X-...) and name me the thing you disagree with. Would you like your child to play with "cheap plastic toys that contain hormone disrupting phthalates up to 240 times above the legal limit"? Or silicone-free cosmetics which contain silicone in the list of ingredients? Or a helmet which is "clearly insufficient to protect users"?

It's easy to undersell the domestic market if you completely ignore all of the regulation that's applicable to literally any store located within the market.

shivasaxena14• 12 months ago

No, but then they should issue fines to Temu and force it to comply. I would whole heartedly support EU commission then.

However their actions till now have been about shutting down competition(changing custom rules on international packages).

It's easy to undersell the domestic market if you completely ignore all of the regulation that's applicable to literally any store located within the market.

No credit to Chinese for running a efficient supply chain operation?

raverbashing• 12 months ago

I guess it's fine to buy the stickers from Temu but know that China massively subsidizes the shipping costs

For other stuff, well, it's probably hit or miss

maxglute4• 12 months ago

massively subsidizes the shipping costs

This another one of those allegations where muh PRC subsidies makes no sense, especially since we're 5 years past UPU reforms... as in PRC companies haven't had preferential postage rates for years. They're just good at logistics now... bulk ship via air / preloading local ware houses then have local shippers hand last mile to keep per item shipping low. TEMU/Ali still has pretty healthy markup, like 100-200+% vs domestic. That's basically enough for margins and offset air shipping when dealing with trinkets. Order any big item and shipping price explodes, proportional to weight. Buying straight from PRC is cheap because you're not paying multiple middle men for same item. Sometimes middlemen is worth it, i.e. Amazon where you pay 10 dollars from transhippers vs 7 dollars directly from PRC vs 20 dollars from retailer because Amazon refund policy worth it small premium.

lm284693• 12 months ago

50 years later (aka now for most of the west): "Why did we lose all our industries ? Why is it so hard to find a job ? Why is all the know how in China now ? Why is China buying our ports/airports ?? Why is our social model collapsing ? Why is our health care system collapsing ? Why is our pension system collapsing ?"

Everything has a cost, that cost usually goes far beyond the displayed $$$.

Amazon.de for example launched free delivery to estonia and other small european countries only recently post rise of temu.

Is that supposed to be a good thing ? Both are killing local businesses by selling at loss because they're playing the long game. Life has more to offer than amazon prime and temu's gadgets

shivasaxena14• 12 months ago

50 years later (aka now for most of the west): "Why did we lose all our industries ? Why is it so hard to find a job ? Why is all the know how in China now ? Why is China buying our ports/airports ?? Why is our social model collapsing ? Why is our health care system collapsing ? Why is our pension system collapsing ?"

Answer would be because we shielded our firms from foreign competition by putting in place such anti-competitive policies. Our firms had no incentive to be efficient since they had a captive market for half a billion consumers they could bleed dry.

Concrete example for this would automobiles and VW v/s BYD/Xiomi in particular.

pjc506• 12 months ago

In fairness, if there's one place in Europe where locally produced products are going to be wildly expensive, it's definitely Switzerland.

(Switzerland isn't even in the EU, it's just landlocked by it)

shivasaxena14• 12 months ago

Sure, but I also gave the example of 12 EUR wine opener at Esselunga in Italy which I can get for 2 EUR on Temu.

microtonal2• 12 months ago

Sorry, but there are so many things wrong with this comment that it's hard to know where to start. It was found that 85%-95% of the products from Temu, AliExpress, and Shein do not fulfill the requirements of European product safety laws. [1] Many of them are grave violations like use of lead, electronics that are fire/electrocution hazards, kid's toys with small parts or other safety issues (like again, lead).

IANAL, but EU laws puts the responsibility of damage on who manufactures, manufactures parts, and who imports the product [2]. This means if you are an EU company, even if you produce in China, you are responsible when kids get lead poisoning or a house burns down when your electronics didn't obey safety margins. Making safe products is more expensive, it requires proper design, not skimping on components, and testing the products in a lab. Temu/Ali/etc. sellers do not have to bear any responsibility, because they typically do not have any offices in the EU, so how are you even going to sue them? So, they don't have the same cost because they can skimp on all the safety requirements.

Second, designing products requires human labor. For instance, I am quite familiar (through contacts) with the ergonomic keyboard market. Designing an ergonomic keyboard can require years of iteration. Multiply by the salary of the keyboard designer and you can understand why you can not sell such a product just above cost price. However, on Ali, etc. you can buy ergonomic keyboards that are either license violations of open designs (that typically have a CC license that does not allow commercial use) or outright copies of non-open designs.

It's easy to provide something at cut-throat prices when you are stealing the bulk of the work.

And then we are not even talking about the absolute environmental waste of sending individual packages to customers in place of bulk shipping.

EU is absolutely right to regulate this. Temu etc. are making money by externalizing most of the cost (monetary, environmental, safety, etc.). Make Temu etc. open an EU office and require them to ship from that office. In that way they have to comply to European safety regulations and can be held accountable if some kid dies, or a house burns down from unsafe electronics.

Before anyone comes with the tired sinophobia argument: I am not criticizing China. There are many Chinese companies that do business in the EU and do not try to dodge local regulations.

[1] https://www.nvwa.nl/nieuws-en-media/nieuws/2025/01/16/nederl...

[2] https://europa.eu/youreurope/business/dealing-with-customers...

maxglute4• 12 months ago

Temu opened European warehouses this year, I assume they can be sued in Europe.

oliwarner2• 12 months ago

Regulatory capture can be such a loaded term but this finding was about safety compliance.

Your tiny-batch stickers reflect of local wage levels more than EU regulation. VAT will be part of it too.

But on safety compliance, the electrical crap that Temu (et al) rain on our countries is a fire hazard. It shouldn't be controversial that goods that don't meet EU standards be barred.

When sales are direct B2C, the EU can't retroactively (or prospectively) stop them, nor recall sent units, not in the way they can when a container rocks up with tens of thousands of units that turn out to be dodgy.

I don't know what the answer is. Making Temu (et al) liable for goods' compliance —in the way importers are— seems like a sensible start.

shivasaxena14• 12 months ago

Fine, but I also gave the example of 12 EUR for a wine opener that I can get for 2 EUR on temu. Lots of people in this thread pointed out how Temu doesn't pay VAT and/or other taxes etc which were plain trumpian style misinformation.

In my mind this 10 eur markup on this simple cheap good is directly related to lack of competition in retail in europe.

I don't know what the answer is. Making Temu (et al) liable for goods' compliance —in the way importers are— seems like a sensible start.

Sure! However the way things are moving, it'll end with Temu/Shein being banned in europe in a few months.

hulitu• 12 months ago

These actions by EU commision are vehemently anti-consumer and anti-business under the transparent guise of being pro-consumer and pro-business.

Yes, and they are sponsored^Wlobbied by Amazon because it eats Amazon's core business.

mytailorisrich10• 12 months ago

Their preliminary findings indicate that Temu engages in illegal practices like ... gamification of shopping.

It's one thing to protect consumers, it's another to treat them like children by banning everything.

amelius5• 12 months ago

Making them play by the rules is not the same thing as banning.

mytailorisrich10• 12 months ago

I am commenting on quote that states that "gamification of shopping" (whatever that means in practice) is illegal. Surely "illegal" means "banned"?

pjc506• 12 months ago

It does mean banning actors which don't play by the rules. But we can't just deploy thought terminating cliche here, we need to look at what the rules actually are.

fxtentacle11• 12 months ago

Looking at how much damage gambling debts cause in Asia, I believe it’s pretty reasonable to just ban lootboxes. Both in video games and the sort of gambling that Temu offers.

snvzz• 12 months ago

Same argument could be made for banning alcohol.

victorbjorklund• 12 months ago

How is it relavant that some people in Asia suffers from gambling addiction for wether or not to allow companies in EU to provide discounts to customers?

amelius5• 12 months ago

I mean the gamification that Temu does is a way to make prices less transparent.

This kind of behavior is explicitly forbidden by market authorities.

I don't see any reason why we should allow it, or why consumers would be better off with this gamification.

This has nothing to do with freedom to do whatever you want, but everything with a seller which is doing everything it can to confuse buyers. A market needs rules. And we should not allow a seller to determine all the rules.

carstenhag• 12 months ago

Every day I get ads by Temu saying "get this electric bicycle for 0€", "this tablet is available for free" and other very misleading claims. Apparently you have to have bought many other things before in order to save up enough "coins" or whatever to get that, but this is not mentioned in the ads and thus illegal.

lousken• 12 months ago

Can they block Temu completely if they fail to comply? Or just fine them?

juliangmp• 12 months ago

One can dream of it being banned permanently...

EU Commission finds Temu in breach of online platform rules

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