Digital Services Act: Financial expert criticizes inadequate consumer protection

Digital Services Act: Financial expert criticizes inadequate consumer protection

According to a report by www.e-recht24.de, the EU Commission has promoted the Digital Services Act (DSA) as the first regulatory system of its kind that sets global standards. The goal of the DSA is to better protect consumers, especially on large online platforms and search engines. Since the end of August, these platforms have been prohibited from using manipulative design tricks such as eye-catching buttons and complicated menu navigation. In addition, criteria for displaying advertising must be disclosed and the general terms and conditions must be provided in understandable language.

However, the assessment of consumer advocates 100 days after the DSA came into force is sobering. The Federal Association of Consumer Organizations (vzbv) has investigated companies such as Amazon, Booking.com, Google Shopping and YouTube and found that all platforms violate the DSA regulations. At Amazon, for example, users are enticed to take out a Prime subscription with conspicuous yellow buttons, while the option to order without Prime is designed to be inconspicuous. Unacceptable, penetrating repetitions of questions to users were also discovered on YouTube.

In addition, the Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat and X (formerly Twitter) platforms do not meet the DSA's advertising transparency requirements. The general terms and conditions are often up to 50 A4 pages long and written in extremely complex language, which violates the requirements of the DSA.

Overall, it remains to be seen that twelve of the 19 tech companies affected by the Digital Services Act do not meet the requirements. In view of these unsatisfactory results, the vzbv calls on the federal government to ensure efficient national monitoring of online platforms. In the long term, these shortcomings can lead to lower consumer trust in online platforms and also affect the market shares of the companies concerned. The measures required to meet the DSA requirements could also mean additional costs for companies. This may lead to a shift in the competitive landscape in the market where smaller companies may be better able to meet the requirements of the DSA.