Judge says Amazon not liable for selling exploding hoverboard
June 2, 2018, cnbc
A judge in Tennessee has ruled that Amazon is not liable for the damage and injuries caused when a hoverboard exploded and burned down a family’s home, CNBC reports. The plaintiff, Megan Fox, argued that Amazon did not properly warn her family about the dangers of the product, but the judge did not agree with her. It’s the latest legal victory for Amazon, which has for years fended off litigation related to product quality and safety by arguing that, for a big and growing part of its business, it’s just a marketplace.
Chemicals group announces support for bipartisan legislation promoting accurate labels
June 7, 2018, American Chemistry Council
The American Chemistry Council (ACC), a member of the Coalition for Accurate Product Labels, today announced its support for the bipartisan Accurate Labels Act (ALA) as introduced by Senator Jerry Moran (R-KS) and Representatives Adam Kinzinger (R-IL) and Kurt Schrader (D-OR). “Consumers have a right to accurate, common sense labels that reflect the best available science,” said American Chemistry Council President and Chief Executive Officer Cal Dooley. “However, a growing number of states and localities are requiring labels that imply risks when none exist. The ALA offers a bipartisan solution to this labeling chaos and misinformation that is creating consumer confusion, driving up costs and creating unreasonable regulatory burdens for farmers, manufacturers and small businesses.”
California assembly approves flame retardant ban
June 4, 2018, Chemical Watch
A measure that would ban the sale of children’s products, mattresses and upholstered furniture containing flame retardants in California has been approved by the state Assembly and awaits action in the Senate. The Assembly approved the bill, AB 2998, on 30 May by a 58-12 vote.
Amazon will stop selling connected toy filled with security issues
June 5, 2018, CBS News
That soft teddy bear seems harmless — until hackers can use it to spy on your kids. Amazon said it has pulled CloudPets, a smart toy that researchers said was riddled with security flaws, from its online store. Last week, Walmart and Target stopped selling the toy. Amazon began removing CloudPets on Tuesday morning. The decision comes a day after Mozilla contacted Amazon with research showing new vulnerabilities on CloudPets.
Ruthless “conline” sellers tempting a quarter of North West into buying fake electrical goods
June 6, 2018, Burnley Express
Shocking statistics released today reveal that a quarter of people in the North West are falling victim to buying counterfeit electrical goods online. A new investigation by UK consumer protection charity Electrical Safety First uncovers dangerous electrical goods for sale on e-commerce sites. And some of the most popular e-commerce sites are being misused by ruthless sellers as a platform to exploit online shoppers in the North West, exposing them to thousands of counterfeit, substandard and suspected recalled electrical goods.
Study: Consumer product safety testing misses cancer risks from chemicals mixture
June 4, 2018, ewg.org
Mixtures of chemicals commonly found in consumer products are more likely to increase breast cancer risk than the same chemicals individually, according to a new analysis. But safety tests by government regulators don’t routinely evaluate the combined effects of multiple chemical exposures according to an environmental advocacy group.
Trigger warning: The Army got upgraded guns. For months, the public didn’t.
June 6, 2018, CNN
When gun manufacturer Sig Sauer was about to land a massive deal in 2016 to supply the US Army with a new pistol, the military made a disturbing discovery during testing. If dropped at a certain angle, the gun would go off by itself. The company won the deal last year anyway, then fixed the guns before shipping them. The Army’s apparent endorsement helped make a nearly identical Sig Sauer pistol, the P320, a popular choice for police departments and the general public. But for several months, the company sold its commercial version of the gun without the fix it had made for the military, a CNN investigation has found.
Consumer rights in a radically different marketplace
June 4, 2018, Policy Options
Up until the rise of the Internet and digital technology, consumers were, as Daniel Defoe noted in The Complete English Tradesman (1726), “the last article” or “utmost end” in a trade chain. As buyers of goods and services, consumers were passive actors in the market economy. Starting in 1970s, the regulation of consumer rights (through consumer protection legislation) was framed around this paradigm of consumers as passive actors and focused largely on product safety and warranties. But digital technology and the globalized networked information economy have fundamentally changed the very concept of a consumer.
Lowes to stop selling paint strippers with toxic chemicals
May 29, 2018, UPI.com
Lowe’s plans to stop selling paint-removal products with toxic chemicals that have been blamed for killing dozens of people, the home improvement store announced. The company said it will phase out paint-stripping products that include methylene chloride and N-Methyl-2-pyrrolidone, also known as NMP, by the end of the year.
Almost all European diesel cars are dirty
June 7, 2018, Popular Mechanics
A new emissions study based on testing methods that are supposedly “difficult-to-impossible to cheat” has revealed that even the latest models of European diesel cars are bad polluters. The first such analysis since the 2015 Volkswagen diesel emissions scandal, the results show more than 4,000 vehicle models exceeding nitrogen oxides (NOx) levels set by the European Union.
