Ref. Ares(2024)665456 - 29/01/2024
CAB REYNDERS/1943 - Meeting with Tim Cook CEO of Apple
ADDENDUM – Consumers issues
Empowering consumers
• A political agreement with the Parliament and the Council was reached on 19 Sept
2023.
• This piece of legislation is a major contribution to the green transition and the
consumers’ participation to it.
• The proliferation of sustainability labels and environmental claims and their lack of
transparency and reliability is a major obstacle to more sustainable consumption
behaviour.
• With the new rules we are requiring such labels to be third party certified. We are also
forbidding vague environmental claims like “green” or “environmentally friendly”
where the environmental excellent performance of the product cannot be
demonstrated, so that consumers are not getting the impression that products are
‘greener’ than they are.
• Moreover, companies will be no longer able to claim that their products are “climate
neutral” or “carbon positive” based on offsetting projects outside their value chain.
All these measures are important tools for consumers to understand the climate and
environmental impact of their choice in clothing, electronics, food, flights, etc.
• We are also introducing bans against premature failures of goods which will protect
consumers from poorly produced products that break down sooner than they should.
• Before buying a product, consumers will also be informed through a new EU
harmonised label on how long goods will last and about their legal guarantee rights.
This will ensure that products we buy last and are used longer and that consumers are
aware of their rights in case the product breaks down.
• We are also adding additional information requirements for traders on e.g. software
updates, reparability and spare parts, which will help the consumer to consume and
use products more sustainably.
• Greenwashing and early obsolescence practices harm the Single Market as it allows
companies to gain unfair advantages over their competitors. By introducing these new
rules, consumers can choose products that are genuinely better for the environment,
which will also encourage competition on sustainable goods.
• This agreement will also strongly promote an economy based on circularity, together
with the sister-proposals on Green Claims, Eco-design for sustainable products and
the Right to repair.
Right to Repair proposal • The proposal for promoting the repair of goods will contribute to consumers’ right to
repair together with other initiatives such as the proposal for Ecodesign for Sustainable
Products Regulation and the proposal for a Directive on empowering consumers for the
green transition.
• With this proposal, we want to make repair a more attractive solution to consumers
instead of discarding defective products and buying new ones.
• This is why we propose to oblige producers of goods that are subject to current and future
reparability requirements under EU law, to offer repair. We also propose that all repairers
provide consumers with a European Repair Information Form allowing them to compare
offers from different repairers.
• In addition, the national online repair platforms will help consumers to quickly find
suitable local repairers as well as help SMEs to reach a wider range of customers.
• The proposal is currently with the co-legislators which are aiming to adopt the proposal
still within this EP mandate.
Cookies pledge • The Commission is currently working on the cookies pledge announced by you on 28
March at the 2023 Consumer Summit.
• The goal of this initiative is to address the issue of ‘cookie fatigue’ and to provide
consumers with clearer information and a better understanding of digital advertising
models and personalisation technics as well as means to automatise their decision.
• From the discussions held so far, further reflection is needed on consumers’
understanding of the various types of advertising presented to them and the consequences
for their privacy preferences. The feasibility of alternative advertising models (such as for
instance contextual advertising) is also being discussed. High level principles for the
pledge are still expected to be finalised by the end of 2023.
• Apple participates in the pledge. During the contacts with the Commission Apple
underlined that they value the protection of their users’ data and explained the measures
implemented by Apple to this aim notably the settings to manage cookies from the
browser Safari and Iphone’s Operating Systems.
• We count on Apple to continue its involvement in the work to define the pledging
principles, as well to commit to them. It is important that providers of browsers
implement easy to use settings in relation to privacy. It is also important that for its own
advertising activities, Apple enables users to chose for non tracking based advertising.
About Apple’s Appstore geoblocking practice
• When creating the (required) account for an Iphone, a consumer only sees the
AppStore version specific to the nationality, place of residence or place of
establishment chosen and cannot access other Appstores.
• This raises issues when users are travelling as they may be blocked to use local apps.
Many of the services affected have no element of protected copyrighted material.
• In addition, Apple requires the use of credit cards issued in the country registered in
the user account, again this is a problem for persons living in several countries but
using one credit cards.
• According to the Geoblocking Regulation this should not happen in the EU as there is
free circulation of people and services and payment means are accepted everywhere.
