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EU fines Temu €200M for allowing sale of illegal products

bbc.co.uk

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Re: EU fines Temu €200M for allowing sale of illegal products

#71

Post by tpm »

dylan604 wrote: post #16
mdrzn wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you won't be able to sell in the EU market anymore

Doesn’t Temu direct ship to the customer? What if they ship in plain unmarked packaging and keep changing the address of the sender? Is the EU customs peeps just going to start inspecting every single package from China looking for items from Temu? That sounds like a logistical nightmare. This sounds like old school thinking where you can stop whole containers full of stuff from a single supplier.

What logistic company will ship plain unmarked packages? They simply wouldn't be delivered at all.

> Is the EU customs peeps just going to start inspecting every single package from China looking for items from Temu?

They might, why not. It would be unwise to pick a fight like this for any company.

Re: EU fines Temu €200M for allowing sale of illegal products

#72

Post by johanvts »

spwa4 wrote: post #53
crote wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, because it is the start of enforcement. That's how it works, not just a one-and-done slap on the wrist. If they don't fix it, it'll eventually continue to the "20% of worldwide revenue" kind of fine everyone on HN was so afraid of when the GDPR was introduced. But that's not what it starts with.

So you're saying if I start a company in the EU that violates safety standards, copyright, trademarks, ... I will be allowed to profit of that for 3 years (let's pretend it's just 3 years that Chinese producers have been doing that) before facing any consequences and at that point STILL only be required to clean up my act (ie. not face any consequences for violations already done)? I find this incredibly, incredibly…

If you start the company in China and ship to EU. If you start it in a EU country I think local laws will stop you much faster than the EU commission. Still there are plenty of grifters that start fraudulent companies in the EU and roll assets into a new one as they bankrupt, and they can operate for decades before they eventually get stopped.

Re: EU fines Temu €200M for allowing sale of illegal products

#73

Post by another-dave »

jordiburgos wrote: post #60

Why there is a difference between selling and allowing to sell? If the product is sold in your site, you must be responsible of it.

they are responsible for it, but it's useful in reporting to differentiate between "fulfilled by" and "bought through"

Re: EU fines Temu €200M for allowing sale of illegal products

#74

Post by lefra »

manoDev wrote: post #56

Isn't there some kind of law to disallow imports without a CE / RoHS / etc label? Why allow it to enter the EU, and then fine the seller afterwards?

For electronics without wireless functionality, it is allowed to self-certify. Anyone could also print whatever label they want on their products illegally (i.e. without doing the required paperwork to self-certify).

The policemen controlling imports don't have the competency to check for faults, so we get this situation where specialists regularly sample the products, and heavy fines are issued to the importer.

Re: EU fines Temu €200M for allowing sale of illegal products

#75

Post by hydrogen7800 »

jordiburgos wrote: post #60

Why there is a difference between selling and allowing to sell? If the product is sold in your site, you must be responsible of it.

> If the product is sold in your site, you must be responsible of it.

But this is an internet store.

Re: EU fines Temu €200M for allowing sale of illegal products

#76

Post by holistio »

kvgr wrote: post #55

I am very pro free market, but Temu with data harvesting and selling illegal projects should be banned together with tiktok...

If you're "pro free market, but", you're not pro free market. That's fine, but you might want to reevaluate whether you're actually for it.

Re: EU fines Temu €200M for allowing sale of illegal products

#77

Post by s_dev »

manoDev wrote: post #56

Isn't there some kind of law to disallow imports without a CE / RoHS / etc label? Why allow it to enter the EU, and then fine the seller afterwards?

The fine is the application of the law. Would be like getting arrested and demanding to know why the authorities aren't getting involved.

Re: EU fines Temu €200M for allowing sale of illegal products

#78

Post by s_dev »

holistio wrote: post #76
kvgr wrote: post #55

I am very pro free market, but Temu with data harvesting and selling illegal projects should be banned together with tiktok...

If you're "pro free market, but", you're not pro free market. That's fine, but you might want to reevaluate whether you're actually for it.

The US and China have standards as well and bodies to regulate them. Regulation vs Free Market debate isn't a binary issue and is a spectrum.

Re: EU fines Temu €200M for allowing sale of illegal products

#80

Post by alephnerd »

This has been going on for a year now.

The EU began enforcing a small parcel tax directly against Temu last May [0] and France has been strongly lobbying against Shein and Temu [1]. The EU has also made Chinese overproduction a critical topic of discussion for EU-China relations [2][3], and barring Temu and Shein is backed by both unions and industrial groups within Europe [4].

All of this is linking to the EU's strategy of playing hardball against Chinese support of Russia's invasion of Ukraine [5][6], as well as pushing back against the Chinese perception that the EU is a has-been [7] as well as conducting an active info-war against a European state [8].

[0] - https://www.ft.com/content/102e18d7-d06b-4405-a347-97bb3c373...

[1] - https://www.ft.com/content/b1fdbad1-2793-4975-a10b-74bb928d3...

[2] - https://www.reuters.com/sustainability/society-equity/eu-law...

[3] - https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-room/20260326IP...

[4] - https://www.lemonde.fr/economie/article/2025/09/15/les-indus...

[5] - https://www.bruegel.org/podcast/how-war-ukraine-reshaping-eu...

[6] - https://www.osw.waw.pl/en/publikacje/osw-commentary/2025-01-...

[7] - https://fddi.fudan.edu.cn/_t2515/57/f8/c21257a743416/page.ht...

[8] - https://www.defense.gouv.fr/desinformation/nos-analyses-froi...

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