Digital Commons Network^™

Development Of Thai Consumer Protection Indicators With The Current Situation Of Related Consumer Protection., Wanna Sriwiriyanupap, Sorachai Jamniandamrongkarn, Suntaree Watcharadamrongkun, Sareerarote Sukamolson, Usawadee Sutapuk, Itthaboon Onwongsa, Jiratchaya Kammee, Tanatporn Apipakdee

The Thai Journal of Pharmaceutical Sciences

Background: In Thailand, consumer protection activities are carried out by government agencies, civic groups, and academic institutions. However, there has been no development of National Consumer Protection Indicators to assess and monitor the effectiveness of consumer protection activities and to forecast their future development. This study aimed to develop Thai consumer protection indicators (TCPI) aligned with international standards and to analyze the current situation of consumer protection in Thailand. Methods: This study was conducted with two qualitative methods (documentary research and group discussion) and held between August 2022 and October 2023. The process of developing a National Consumer Protection Indicator …

After Ftx: Can The Original Bitcoin Use Case Be Saved?, Mark Burge

Faculty Scholarship

Bitcoin and the other cryptocurrencies spawned by the innovation of blockchain programming have exploded in prominence, both in gains of massive market value and in dramatic market losses, the latter most notably seen in connection with the failure of the FTX cryptocurrency exchange in November 2022. After years of investment and speculation, however, something crucial has faded: the original use case for Bitcoin as a system of payment. Can cryptocurrency-as-a-payment-system be saved, or are day traders and speculators the actual cryptocurrency future? This article suggests that cryptocurrency has been hobbled by a lack of foundational commercial and consumer-protection law that …

Navigating Unfair Contract Terms: Drawing Insights From Australia In Addressing The Legal Conundrum In Malaysia, Ibtisam@Ilyana Ilias, Norazlina Abdul Aziz, Hariz Sufi Zahari, Helza Nova Lita

International Journal on Consumer Law and Practice

In Malaysia, the regulation of unfair contract terms within business-to-consumer contracts falls under the jurisdiction of Part IIIA of the Consumer Protection Act 1999. This regulatory framework is overseen by the Ministry of Domestic Trade and Living Cost. However, the effectiveness of Part IIIA is hindered by certain gaps, resulting in its infrequent utilization for determining unfair terms in consumer contracts. One of the primary challenges lies in interpreting key terms such as “harsh,” “oppressive,” “unconscionable,” and “adequate justification.” These ambiguities often remain unresolved until legal proceedings take place. Complicating matters, doubts persist regarding the applicability of the Consumer Protection …

Reviewing The Organization Of The Consumer Right To Withdraw In Electronic Transactions In Qatar, Mahmoud Fayyad, Reinhard Steennot

International Journal on Consumer Law and Practice

This research identifies and analyses weaknesses in Qatar’s legal regulatory framework for the right to withdraw in electronic transactions, understands the causes of consumer dissatisfaction and their impact, and conducts a comparative analysis of European law to extract insights for improving Qatar’s legal regulations and organizational structure. This research employs a quantitative methodology, utilizing a survey administered to a random sample of 391 consumers. The survey will gather data on consumer perceptions, experiences, and satisfaction levels related to the right to withdraw in electronic transactions in Qatar. The results revealed a need for more confidence among Qatari consumers when purchasing …

Algorithms And Competition In The Digital Economy, Cary Coglianese, Alicia Lai

Articles

No abstract provided.

The Application Of Transactional Fairness To The Gambling Sector, Seamus Mcgowan, Adam Rivers

International Conference on Gambling & Risk Taking

The idea of ‘fairness’ in consumer protection has been discussed for a long time. However, more recently there has been a renewed focus on the use of unfair pricing practices and terms in consumer markets and regulators and lawmakers are responding. Practices which can be considered unfair often emerge as companies develop new and innovative ways to engage with consumers including offering different prices and / or terms to different sets of customers.

Being ‘fair and open’ is an important principle for gambling regulation. In that context, this paper focusses on fairness in gambling markets and seeks to develop a …

Beyond Section 230 Liability For Facebook, Nancy S. Kim

St. John's Law Review

(Excerpt)

In October 2021, a former Facebook employee, Frances Haugen, publicly revealed that the company's internal research documented harms that its products caused some of its users. The company’s response was sadly predictable. It questioned the reliability of Haugen’s testimony, asserted its commitment to doing the right thing, and then diverted the public’s attention by changing its name to Meta. The company’s deny-and-distract tactics were, by now, all too familiar and provided few answers.

More than any other platform company, Facebook has found itself at the center of controversy. Its advertisement-supported business model relies upon user engagement which means that …

What A Data Privacy Law Should Look Like In West Virginia: Balancing Competing Interests Of Consumers And Businesses, Harrison Enright

West Virginia Law Review

Today’s businesses invariably leverage consumer data to create business insights, such as marketing strategies and consumer behavior analyses. As a result, consumers have placed an emphasis on data privacy and security. In response, many states have proposed comprehensive legislation aspiring to regulate the collection and usage of consumer data by businesses, grant individual rights to consumers, and provide for a method of enforcement. House Bill 3159 represents West Virginia’s most recent attempt at doing so, serving as an indication that the state is working diligently to enhance the data privacy of its residents.

Although enacting a comprehensive data privacy law …

Price Gouging, The Pandemic, And What Comes Next, Kaitlin A. Caruso

Faculty Publications

Whenever there is a disaster, there are complaints of price gouging — that is, of people selling critical goods at grossly inflated prices. Over the last half-century, states and territories have increasingly responded by adopting anti-gouging laws that limit how much sellers can increase prices on at least some goods and services during an emergency. An overwhelming majority of jurisdictions now have such laws, and all share a few common characteristics. The laws vary considerably between jurisdictions, however, including on what products, services, and sellers they cover, how long they last, and how strictly they limit price increases. This Article …

Regulatory Innovation And Permission To Fail: The Case Of Suptech, Hilary J. Allen

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

The recent U.S. Supreme Court decision West Virginia v. EPA has cast a pall over the discretion of administrative agencies at a very inopportune time. The private sector is currently adopting new technologies at a rapid pace, and as regulated industries become more technologically complex, administrative agencies must innovate technological tools of their own in order to keep up. Agencies will increasingly struggle to do their jobs without that innovation, but the private sector is afforded something that is both critical to the innovation process, and often denied to administrative agencies: “permission to fail.” Without some grace for the inevitable …

Protecting Low-Income Consumers In The Era Of Digital Grocery Shopping: Implications For Wic Online Ordering, Qi Zhang, Priyanka Patel, Caitlin M. Lowery

Community & Environmental Health Faculty Publications

The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) is now expected to allow participants to redeem their food benefits online, i.e., via online ordering, rather than only in-store. However, it is unclear how this new benefit redemption model may impact participants’ welfare since vendors may have an asymmetric information advantage compared with WIC customers. The WIC online ordering environment may also change the landscape for WIC vendors, which will eventually affect WIC participants. To protect WIC consumers’ rights in the new online ordering model, policymakers need an appropriate legal and regulatory framework. This narrative review provides that …

Animal Welfare Consumer Protection Litigation: Challenges And Possibilities For Bringing About More "Humane" Labeling Practices, Jaycie Thaemert

Animal Law Review

Consumer protection claims have become a critical tool for animal welfare advocates to attack the misrepresentations that animal agriculture producers make about the humane treatment of their animals. Currently, these claims are an important accountability mechanism, as “humane” labeling standards have not been adopted on the federal level. As consumers become increasingly focused on making ethical food-purchasing decisions, consumer protection claim lawsuits have become more and more successful, drawing the attention of attorneys within and outside of the animal welfare movement. The primary limitation of consumer protection claims in the animal welfare space is that these lawsuits do not actually …

Payment Profiles: Using Payment Transaction Data To Identify And Characterize Gamblers, Kasra Ghaharian

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Payment providers in the gambling industry facilitate transactions, allowing customers to transfer money to and from wagering accounts. Payments transaction data is information that is captured from these transactions, including, for example, the type, amount, time, and location. How this data may be used for gambling harm minimization and prevention has garnered significant interest, particularly due to accelerated payments modernization in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. With this study, I explored the utility of payments transaction data to categorize subgroups of gamblers in order to identify individuals who may be at-risk of harm. I benchmarked six cluster analysis methods …

Dynamic Pricing Algorithms, Consumer Harm, And Regulatory Response, Alexander Mackay, Samuel Weinstein

Faculty Articles

Pricing algorithms are rapidly transforming markets, from ride-sharing, to air travel, to online retail. Regulators and scholars have watched this development with a wary eye. Their focus so far has been on the potential for pricing algorithms to facilitate explicit and tacit collusion. This Article argues that the policy challenges pricing algorithms pose are far broader than collusive conduct. It demonstrates that algorithmic pricing can lead to higher prices for consumers in competitive markets and even in the absence of collusion. This consumer harm can be initiated by a single firm employing a superior pricing algorithm. Higher prices arise from …

Gamestop And The Reemergence Of The Retail Investor, Jill E. Fisch

All Faculty Scholarship

The GameStop trading frenzy in January 2021 was perhaps the highest profile example of the reemergence of capital market participation by retail investors, a marked shift from the growing domination of those markets by large institutional investors. Some commentators have greeted retail investing, which has been fueled by app-based brokerage accounts and social media, with alarm and called for regulatory reform. The goals of such reforms are twofold. First, critics argue that retail investors need greater protection from the risks of investing in the stock market. Second, they argue that the stock market, in term, needs protection from retail investors. …

The Internet Of Citizens: A Lawyer’S View On Some Technological Developments In The United Kingdom And India*, Guido Noto La Diega

Indian Journal of Law and Technology

This article aspires to constitute a useful tool for both Asian and European readers as regards some of the state-of-the-art technologies revolving around the Internet of Things (‘IoT’) and their intersection with cloud computing (the Clouds of Things, ‘CoT’) in both the continents. The main emerging legal issues will be presented, with a focus on intellectual property, consumer protection, and privacy. The cases chosen are from India and the United Kingdom, two countries that are conspicuously active on this front. I will give an account only of (what I consider to be) the highlights of the IoT in India and …

Consumer Protection Of Persons With Disabilities Amidst The Covid-19, James Keith C. Heffron

Center for Business Research and Development

The Persons with Disabilities (PWD) sector was one of the most overlooked and affected sectors during the COVID-19 pandemic. As consumers, PWDs have suffered difficult challenges in the access of essential goods and services, including healthcare, and these challenges have been unduly aggravated because of the crisis. The article exposes and examines the negative impact of the crisis on the consumer rights and behavior of PWDs with a special focus on the novel barriers brought about by the pandemic on their right to access. The current pre-pandemic legislation is not adequate to protect PWDs from these novel barriers as there …

Detoxing From Clean Claims: Bridging The Gap Between "Clean" And "Dirty" Beauty, Alecsandra Dragus

William & Mary Business Law Review

The clean beauty industry has gained increasing popularity in the last couple of years. This has spurred the development of many brands and impacted what consumers look for in their products. This Note engages in the existing conversation in the beauty industry pertaining to "clean" products by showing that the lack of interference from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to set definitional criteria for what constitute ''clean" products has resulted in an increase in the commercialization of health-conscious consumer beliefs based on ambiguous and misleading information. These consumers are stuck in a loop …

Regional Mapping: Digital Provisions Play A Key Role In Asia Pacific Agreements, Henry S. Gao

Research Collection Yong Pung How School Of Law

IT HAS become more commonplace for trade agreements in the Asia Pacific to include a variety of digital trade provisions. To understand the salient features of these agreements, it is helpful to map out their main baseline features. Doing so also indicates where digital trade agreements may be going or need to go. This mapping covers all free trade agreements (FTAs) with chapters on e-commerce or digital trade since 2000 by the main players in the region-China, South Korea, Japan, India, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Vietnam and Malaysia.

The New Bailments, Danielle D’Onfro

Washington Law Review

The rise of cloud computing has dramatically changed how consumers and firms store their belongings. Property that owners once managed directly now exists primarily on infrastructure maintained by intermediaries. Consumers entrust their photos to Apple instead of scrapbooks; businesses put their documents on Amazon’s servers instead of in file cabinets; seemingly everything runs in the cloud. Were these belongings tangible, the relationship between owner and intermediary would be governed by the common-law doctrine of bailment. Bailments are mandatory relationships formed when one party entrusts their property to another. Within this relationship, the bailees owe the bailors a duty of care …

Assessment Of Consumer Protection Act 2019 To Support Tobacco Control In India, Ashok R. Patil

Articles

The use of tobacco products has been clearly established to cause significant medical and economic harm. While specific tobacco control legislation has been enacted in the form of the COTPA 2003, it is important to examine if other legislations can be utilised for regulation of tobacco consumption. One such legislation is the Consumer Protection Act 2019, which significantly expands the rights of consumers and protection given to them in terms of product safety and product quality. Accordingly, this paper provides an in-depth analysis of the Consumer Protection Act 2019 and the scope of utilising this legislation and the jurisprudence on …

Manipulation And The First Amendment, Helen Norton

Publications

No abstract provided.

Market Surveillance To Support Quality Assurance And Consumer Protection For The Solar Payg Products Market In East And West Africa, Hamidah Naishur Nakimuli

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

Off-grid Pay As You Go (PAYG) solar products have become one of the fastest-growing approaches to providing basic electricity services to off-grid households not only in Sub-Saharan Africa but also in many other parts of the world with limited or no access to the grid connection. However, sustainably growing the PAYG solar industry requires paying close attention to product quality from the point of manufacturing to the end user. This research examines how to best design market surveillance programs that ensure quality in off-grid PAYG solar products and strengthen the implementation and enforcement of quality standards in the off-grid solar …

Discrimination On Wheels: How Big Data Uses License Plate Surveillance To Put The Brakes On Disadvantaged Drivers, Nicole Mcconlogue

Faculty Scholarship

As scholarly discourse increasingly raises concerns about the negative societal effects of “fintech,” “dirty data,” and “technochauvinism,” a growing technology provides an instructive illustration of all three of these problems. Surveillance software companies are using automated license plate reader (ALPR) technology to develop predictive analytical tools. In turn, software companies market those tools to auto financers and insurers as a risk assessment input to evaluate consumers seeking to buy a car. Proponents of this technology might argue that more in-formation about consumer travel habits will result in more accurate and individualized risk predictions, potentially increasing vehicle ownership among marginalized groups. …

How Does The Elimination Of State Aid To For-Profit Colleges Affect Enrollment? Evidence From California’S Reforms, Oded Gurantz, Ryan Sakoda, Shayak Sarkar

Upjohn Institute Working Papers

This paper examines how financial aid reform based on postsecondary institutional performance impacts student choice. Federal and state regulations often reflect concerns about the private, for-profit sector’s poor employment outcomes and high loan defaults, despite the sector’s possible theoretical advantages. We use student-level data to examine how eliminating public subsidies to attend low-performing for-profit institutions impacts students’ college enrollment and completion behavior. Beginning in 2011, California tightened eligibility standards for their state aid program, effectively eliminating most for-profit eligibility. Linking data on aid application to administrative payment and postsecondary enrollment records, this paper utilizes a difference-in differences strategy to investigate …

How Does The Elimination Of State Aid To For-Profit Colleges Affect Enrollment?: Evidence From California’S Reforms, Oded Gurantz, Ryan Sakoda, Shayak Sarkar

Upjohn Institute Policy and Research Briefs

No abstract provided.

United States Food Law Update: Health Care Reform, Preemption, Labeling Claims And Unpaid Interns: The Latest Battles In Food Law, A. Bryan Endres, Nicholas R. Johnson, Michaela N. Tarr

Journal of Food Law & Policy

This edition of the Food Law Update explores four legal issues arising in the first half of 2010 reflective of the diverse nature of the food law specialist. As the national debate surrounding the merits of health care reform dominated the legislative agenda, this article first will discuss the food labeling rules embedded within section 4205 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010. The authors then analyze the preemptive reach of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act and the Meat Inspection Act with respect to three separate California statutes regarding animal welfare standards, retail labels on …

Live For Now: Teens, Soda Marketing, And The Law, Richard A. Daynard, F. Brendan Burke, Cara L. Wilking

Journal of Food Law & Policy

The alarming rate of overweight and obesity in U.S. children, adolescents, and adults has focused attention on the marketing of unhealthy foods and beverages.' Adolescents are heavily targeted in marketing for beverages, including sugary drinks like soda. They have higher rates of overweight and obesity than children less than five years of age, and are on a path to have a shorter life expectancy than their parents. This article analyzes soda marketing through the lens of teen biological and psychological development, marketing tactics commonly used with teen audiences, and consumer protection law principles.

Consumer Protection In Ecommerce: A Case Study Of Egypt, Heba Habib

Theses and Dissertations

This paper examines electronic contract regulation in the context of business-to-consumer transactions. The technological advancement and cross-border nature of e-commerce have posed significant challenges to the Egyptian legal framework highlighting the limitations of general commercial contract rules with regards to electronic contracts. This thesis argues that access to the courts is hindered by restrictive terms in the electronic contracts over which the Egyptian law has no jurisdictional power. Accordingly, private institutions set the rules in the e-contracts and enforce them through private methods leaving no room for state intervention to ensure the protection of consumers. Hence, the application of national …

Bully No More: Why Trademark Owners Engage In Trademark Overreach And How To Prevent It, Quynh La

Washington Law Review

At its core, trademark law exists as a tool for consumer protection. Thus, trademark owners use policing and enforcement to maintain a trademark’s goodwill, which in turn protects consumers from confusion. But policing and enforcement can lead to trademark overreach and bullying—which undermine the goal of trademark law. This Comment explains that trademark owners are incentivized to engage in aggressive enforcement tactics because courts weigh enforcement efforts in favor of trademark strength. And strong trademarks receive strong protection because such marks are more likely to succeed in trademark infringement litigation. To curb trademark bullying and realign trademark law with its …