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European Union Launches Action Against Shopping Website Temu Over Illegal Products
October 31, 2024, The Guardian
The European Union has launched formal proceedings against the Chinese shopping website Temu amid concerns it is failing to halt the sale of illegal products online. A formal investigation was opened with the European Commission citing concerns over the platform. With its tagline “shop like a billionaire”, the service has rapidly grown in the EU market since its launch in April last year. It sells everything from cosmetics to clothing as well as furniture and tech, sourced directly in China to about 100 million users. The European Commission said it had numerous concerns that the platform was breaching the new Digital Services Act (DSA), which regulates tech firms ranging from Facebook to X and Google.

Analysis: What Cosmetic Companies Need To Know About The CPSC
November 1, 2024, Foley & Lardner LLP (National Law Review)
As of now, the CPSC regulates a few areas relevant to the cosmetics industry. For example, the CPSC maintains jurisdiction over child-resistant packaging requirements under the Poison Prevention Packaging Act (PPPA). Thus, if certain cosmetics products contain any hazardous substances, those products must comply with the PPPA and are subject to oversight from the CPSC. The CSPC also maintains jurisdiction over other product packaging issues and products relevant to the larger beauty industry (e.g., a hair drier that poses a shock hazard to consumers). As cosmetics companies target younger audiences and expand their offerings beyond products meant just for adults, this may open them up to greater compliance duties to, and regulatory oversight from, the CPSC.

Three Ways To Manage Moments Of Work-Induced Anxiety
October 23, 2024, Harvard Business Review
Owing to our fast-paced workplaces, our collective stress baselines are higher than ever before, and against this backdrop, you might find yourself getting anxious more easily at work. Today, workplace anxiety is common, but it is also manageable and to some degree, even preventable. Our minds and bodies aren’t our enemies; in our modern relentless work environments, they’re our greatest allies — if we know how to use them. To manage workplace anxiety, it is important to adopt approaches to support our salience network (the brain’s system for prioritizing and integrating important information) and calm the nervous system.

Insight: White House Announces New Restrictions On De Minimis Rules
October 30, 2024, Mayer Brown
The White House has announced new actions to address “the significant increased abuse of the de minimis exemption” by China-founded e-commerce platforms. This will strengthen US efforts to target and block shipments that violate US laws. This will also include a series of Notices of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRMs) that will propose changes to the de minimis program. The announcement also notes that the CPSC intends to propose a final rule that would require importers of consumer products to electronically file Certificates of Compliance with both Customs and Border Protection and the CPSC at the time of entry. Finally, the announcement “urges Congressional action on de minimis reform.”

New Protective Layer Could Extend Zinc Battery Lifespan
October 2024, msn.com
The transition to renewable energy requires efficient methods for storing large amounts of electricity. Researchers at the Technical University of Munich have developed a new method that could extend the lifespan of aqueous zinc-ion batteries by several orders of magnitude. Instead of lasting just a few thousand cycles, they could now endure several hundred thousand charge and discharge cycles. The key to this innovation is a special protective layer for the zinc anodes of the batteries.

Study: Black-Colored Plastic Kitchen Utensils, Takeout Containers May Contain Cancerous Chemicals
October 30, 2024, Nation of Change
A new study revealed the implications when recycled plastic from electronics is used in household items. Published in Chemosphere, researchers discovered everyday black plastic cooking utensils contain harmful flame retardants through current recycling processes. While toxic chemicals are banned from certain applications that don’t require flame retardants (FR), their continued use in electronics is of particular concern for researchers due to their recycled presence in other items. These include such items as kitchen utensils, takeout containers, sushi trays and some children’s toys.

Editorial: As Fire Officials Strategize, Federal Lithium-Ion Battery Regulatory Bill Stalls
October 30, 2024, Yahoo News
Fire officials from around the country are gathering with the Fire Department of New York and federal Department of Homeland Security in New York with one pressing focus — addressing the scourge of the exploding battery, specifically the unregulated lithium-ion batteries often used for micro-mobility devices like e-bikes. These batteries, in recent years, have frequently overheated and caused deadly, damaging, and hard-to-put-out fires. The officials from New York, Seattle, Denver, Chicago and Atlanta will share notes on how to track and contend with these fires as they become one of the leading fire hazards. The solution here is to delineate clear regulatory authority to specifically handle these batteries, and fast. Rep. Ritchie Torres and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand are sponsoring legislation in Congress to vest the Consumer Product Safety Commission with the ability and directive to write policies mandating safety standards for such batteries and the devices they power.

Toxic Chemical Exposure Drops In U.S. Post-CA Law
October 30, 2024, Mirage News
With growing concern about the ubiquity of toxic chemicals in consumer products, many states have passed laws aimed at protecting people from harmful substances in everyday items like cosmetics, cleaning supplies, plastics, and food packaging. California’s Proposition 65, for instance, is considered one of the most extensive toxics laws in the country. But does the law work? According to a new study published in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives, it does.

Operationalizing The EU AI Act: Five Compliance Steps To Take Now
October 30, 2024, American Conference Institute (JD Supra)
Now that the European Union’s Artificial Intelligence (AI) Act has entered into force, the real work begins putting its obligations into practice. This article explores five compliance steps to take now to operationalize the AI systems. The AI Act extends extraterritorially by applying to providers inside and outside the EU, as well as applying to providers and deployers outside the EU where the “output” of AI systems is “used in the EU.” Thus, all covered providers and deployers, both inside and outside the EU, should consider the following these baseline compliance steps.

Preventing Liability From Foreign‑Made Products
November 1, 2024, In Compliance Magazine
A quick look through recent 2024 recall notices posted on the website of the Consumer Product Safety Commission reveals that a majority of recalled products were manufactured in China. And a recent analysis of 1^st quarter 2024 recalls by Sedgwick Brand Protection reveals the following products with the highest number of recalls: Sports and recreation, children’s products, electronics, toys, and home appliances. Most of these products are manufactured in China or other locations in Asia. Ultimately, the manufacturer or product seller gets to make a business decision on whom to buy from and what to require them to do. Since it may well be impossible to find a foreign manufacturer that is willing to do all of the things detailed here, the company will need to decide what preventive techniques are priorities and when or if the lack of a technique is a deal breaker. In that way, U.S.-based companies will be better prepared to make a rational business decision and assume a future risk that they deem acceptable.