Survey on cross-border access to online content

The European Commission has published a new Flash Eurobarometer 411 with results of a survey on "Cross-border access to online content". The survey examines with what frequency EU citizens access the Internet (it's least used in Romania, Bulgaria and Portugal) and through what media (portable devices are generally more popular than desktop computers and unsurprisingly, the younger the respondent the more likely he is to use a smartphone to access the Internet) and if they do, then whether they also access digital content online, what types thereof (music and audio-video content is the most popular, while e-books remain quite unpopular - but that may also depend on fact that e-books are mostly mentioned as paid digital content, while music and audio-video content is offered accessed for free). The reasons for not accessing digital content online are also explored (no interest, other access means than digital more attractive, lack of knowledge). With regard to the cross-border options, the study checks the willingness of EU citizens to purchase online digital content in a different than their own language (the majority only accesses it if it's in their country's language), as well as whether they are willing to purchase such content from providers from other Member States and what problems they might have experienced with regard to such purchases (in only half of reported cases EU citizens had no problems accessing digital content generally meant for users of another country).

Misleading apps

We are living in a digital era which is with every year acknowledged a bit more by the European institutions. The European Commission brainstormed last week with the representatives of large tech companies on how to raise consumer awareness of dangers of using apps. Often, consumers upload potentially 'free' applications for which they then purchase various in-app features. Sometimes consumer's credit card will be charged automatically, so he won't even be aware of having made a particular purchase at a given moment. This could be seen as an unfair, potentially misleading commercial practice, since if the consumer knew in advance that he would need to make these payments to use effectively a certain app he might not have installed it in the first place. One way to prevent such practices would be to prohibit direct debit in these apps through default settings. Another point would be to make them less available to children (or provide them with more clear information). At this moment, the European Commission calls for self-regulation of the industry but it could be expected that certain guidelines on this issue would be given to national enforcement authorities of Unfair Commercial Practices Directive. (Commission and Member States to raise consumer concerns with app industry)

For those of you interested in this post, you may find also this new Eurobarometer (Special Eurobarometer 414) survey of use - E-communications Household Survey and Telecom Single Market Survey.

Chemicals' safety

A new Eurobarometer was published which examined Europeans' perception of chemicals and attitudes to safety. The survey followed the fifth anniversary of the entry into force of REACH and its results showed indeed that Europeans feel more secure in using chemicals as well as they believe more that the EU protects them properly. The most interesting findings (to me) were:

• the majority of people think that there are chemicals in articles of daily use, however, only 56% express certainty on this issue;
• with regards to checking ingredients of the products consumers purchase, 81% would look into ingredients of food they buy, but only 23% would check electronics;
• over 52% consumers Europeans disagree that new chemical substances can help in contributing to better environment;
• 46% of Europeans is cautious in purchasing new products containing new chemical substances - they would wait a long time to see whether the product proved to be working and safe before buying it;
• only 2% would buy a new product immediately;
• 49% of respondents believed that EU manufactured products containing chemical substances were safer than those imported from outside the EU.

For other issues, see the Flash Eurobarometer 361.

CESL and Impact Assessment

In view of coming discussions on the proposed Common European Sales Law Regulation, the European Parliament has requested its Impact Assessment Unit to give an appraisal to the Impact Assessment which the Commission has attached to its 2011 proposal. The result of the Unit's work has now been released.

Starting with the document's conclusions, the evaluation would seem very positive: all in all, "The Commission has made considerable efforts to provide a very detailed and transparent impact assessment in which the arguments are clear and logically structured and the limitations and uncertainties of their analysis is acknowledged."

The Commission bases its proposal on the necessity to reduce transaction costs resulting from legal diversity in contract law in order to foster cross-border (online) trade.  As a consequence, the concept of "transaction costs is central to the Impact Assessment (hence IA). 

The EP's document notices that "the way the Commission calculates transaction costs can validly be the object of criticism and is disputed by numerous stakeholders and academics". This criticism, however, must be measured against the fact that "there is [...] no generally accepted definition of the concept of 'transaction costs' and that the method for calculating such costs in contract law is not yet scientifically established."

Is then everything ok? Not really. At the bottom of the conclusions page, the report accompanies praise of the Commission's "transparency" with regard to its methodology with a remark that, however easy to access, eurobarometer surveys are not a great basis for IAs.The more so, in this case, since the respondents in the studies considered were not asked about the CESL but about a "single European contract law"- not quite the same thing (p. 23).

 Furthermore, reading into the report, less "innocent" deficiencies are to be detected. For instance, the IA considers only a limited set of alternative scenarios, and "contrary to the Commission's IA guidelines, the problem definition does not appear to include a scenario describing how the baseline scenario is likely to develop in the future without any new EU action. (p.17).  further, it has ignored the IA Board's invitation to present stakeholders opinions throughout the Impact Assessment and not only in an Annex (p. 25). The report also notices how the statistics used by the commission "could be interpreted differently to demonstrate the contrary", or the very marginal relevance of contract law-related transaction costs to the (under)development of the internal market. 

What then? Even though the Commission's relaxed used of data should be a matter of concern for all those interested in the evolution of European (not only consumer) law, on this spot we can probably agree with the report that, even if the Commission had very badly overestimated the possible impact of the CESL, "given the optional nature of the instrument,  the situation would just be equivalent to the no EU action scenario". Much ado about nothing, but much more fun for lawyers.

Cybercrime - new EU statistics

Cybercrime is internet users worst nigthmare. Due to the worries that if they give their personal information online, someone will record them and misuse them later, many EU internet users do not conclude any transactions online, which does not help to integrate the internal market. Recent findings of an Eurobarometer show that internet users (survey covered 27000 people in all EU Member States - EU citizens concerned by security of personal information and online payments):

• 89% - avoid disclosing personal information online,
• 74% - think that the risk of becoming a victim of cybercrime has increased in the past year,
• 59% - does not feel well informed about risks of cybercrime,
• 40% - is concerned about someone misusing their personal data,
• 38% - is concerned about security of online payments,
• 12% - experienced online fraud,
• 8% - had their identity stolen,

at the same time:

• 53% - have not changed any of their online passwords during the past year!!

Other findings:

• 53% - buy goods or services online,
• 52% - use social networking services,
• 48% - bank online,
• 29% - is not confident about their ability to purchase online or bank online,
• 20% - sell goods or services online,

Pursuant to the proposal of the European Commission of March this year, the European Cybercrime Centre is to be set up as of January 2013 (An EU Cybercrime Centre to fight online criminals and protect e-consumers and A European response to cybercrime). It will aim at protecting internet users from organised crime groups, targeting e-banking etc. It will also try to better protect social network profiles from identity theft, child sexual abuse and other cyber-attacks. Additionally, as of September 2010 works continue on a proposal for a Directive to deal with new cyber-crimes.