The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has helped delist more than 15,000 potentially unsafe products on online marketplaces in the last financial year through its Product Safety Pledge that was launched in November 2020.
Current signatories to the pledge include AliExpress, Amazon Australia, Catch, eBay Australia, and MyDeal.
The ACCC said 98% of regulator-initiated take down requests were actioned within two days.
Pledge signatories also used artificial intelligence, image recognition and automated scanning to prevent hundreds of thousands of unsafe products from being listed for sale in the first place.
“We are pleased to see that pledge signatories continue to use innovative techniques to detect and remove unsafe products from their platforms and prevent them being listed at all,” ACCC Deputy Chair Catriona Lowe said.
“We are encouraged to see signatories taking active steps to create a safer shopping experience for Australian consumers.”
“We urge other online marketplaces to put product safety first by signing up to the pledge.”
The pledge is a voluntary initiative that commits signatories to actively improve product safety online well beyond the current legal requirements and report annually to the ACCC on their performance.
The second annual report, released today, details how signatories performed against 12 product safety commitments and shows that innovative use of technology, combined with education and communication measures promoted seller compliance.
“While platforms quickly removed unsafe products after we contacted them, we would like to see fewer unsafe and non-compliant products being listed in the first place,” Lowe said.
“If you’re selling goods online, it’s your responsibility to check the products are safe and comply with Australian product safety laws.
“Consumers need to be aware that banned, recalled, non-compliant and unsafe products continue to be available for sale online.”
The Australian Product Safety Pledge is modelled on a similar initiative in the European Union, the EU pledge.
The Australian pledge was launched following years of engagement with the four original signatories (AliExpress, Amazon Australia, Catch.com.au and eBay Australia) on improving product safety. MyDeal signed up to the pledge in April 2021.