The EU Digital Fairness Act could introduce tougher consumer protections against subscription traps, hidden online fees and manipulative digital design, as the European Commission seeks to make online businesses more accountable for how they sell products and services.
The proposed legislation, unveiled in Brussels on Wednesday, would require companies to make subscriptions easier to cancel, provide clearer pricing information and give consumers greater control over features designed to keep them using digital platforms for longer. It also proposes new restrictions on influencer marketing, personalised advertising and commercial practices that exploit children.
The European Commission says the measures are intended to address unfair practices that influence purchasing decisions and make it harder for consumers to understand what they are agreeing to when using online services.
“We are tackling the new unfair commercial practices that distort consumers’ choices and put pressure on them, undermining their ability to make informed choices,” said Henna Virkkunen, the Commission’s executive vice-president and commissioner for technology.
One of the central targets is the use of so-called dark patterns, a term describing website and app designs that steer people towards decisions they might not otherwise make. These include misleading messages suggesting that a product is nearly sold out, confusing consent options and cancellation processes deliberately made more difficult than signing up.
Under the proposed rules, digital businesses would face stronger requirements to design their services fairly. Consumers would also have the option to switch off certain features associated with addictive use, including endless scrolling and automatically playing videos.
Subscription services would face additional obligations. Companies would have to remind customers before free trials become paid subscriptions, while automatic renewals would require consumers to make an active choice. The proposal also seeks to make cancelling online contracts more straightforward, addressing a common complaint among users who find it easier to subscribe than to leave a service.
Pricing transparency is another major part of the proposed legislation. Businesses would have to communicate costs clearly, including when prices change depending on demand or other factors. For tickets to sporting and cultural events, consumers should be able to see prices in real time rather than being presented with unclear or misleading information.
The rules would also address virtual currencies used in online games and other digital services. Players sometimes purchase digital credits without having a clear understanding of their value in real money. The Commission wants conversion rates to be more transparent so consumers can better understand how much they are spending.
Children would receive additional protection from gaming practices that encourage excessive spending. The proposal targets mechanisms such as loot boxes, which offer players random virtual rewards in exchange for payment, as well as features that create pressure to spend money to advance in a game. Some of these mechanics imitate gambling, particularly through random rewards and fortune-wheel features.
The proposed restrictions would focus on protecting minors. They would not apply in the same way to adult players, meaning certain features, including loot boxes and streak-based mechanics, could remain permitted for adults.
Influencer marketing is also included in the Commission’s plans. Content creators would face clearer requirements to disclose commercial relationships, while practices that exploit children’s trust would be restricted. The proposal would additionally prohibit unfair personalised advertising and pricing practices that target minors or take advantage of consumers’ vulnerabilities.
The Digital Fairness Act is being introduced alongside a proposed revision of the Consumer Protection Cooperation Regulation, which would strengthen the EU’s ability to investigate and address large-scale consumer protection violations involving businesses operating across national borders.
Under the proposed enforcement changes, the European Commission could investigate major cases directly when they affect consumers in several EU countries. National consumer protection authorities would also be expected to coordinate more efficiently, with deadlines for important stages of investigations and improved arrangements for collecting penalties across different jurisdictions.
Companies found to have breached consumer protection rules in these large-scale cases could face fines of up to 6 per cent of their annual global turnover. The proposal would also require companies based outside the EU to appoint a legal representative within the bloc to cooperate with European and national authorities.
The proposed penalty level is comparable to the maximum fines available under the EU’s Digital Services Act, while the Digital Markets Act allows penalties of up to 10 per cent of a company’s global annual turnover.
European officials see the two proposals as part of a wider effort to update consumer protection rules for an economy increasingly shaped by online platforms, digital advertising, artificial intelligence and subscription-based services.
“The Digital Fairness Act, together with the update to the Consumer Protection Cooperation Regulation, represents the most significant reform of EU consumer protection rules in more than 20 years,” said Michael McGrath, the European commissioner responsible for consumer protection.
The legislation would add to an existing body of EU digital regulation, including the Digital Services Act, Digital Markets Act and Artificial Intelligence Act. It would also complement the proposed EU Kids Act, which aims to place greater responsibility on technology companies to protect children online.
However, the growing number of regulatory proposals has raised questions about whether businesses will face overlapping obligations and additional compliance costs.
Isabelle Roccia, managing director for Europe at the International Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP), told Euronews Next that updating consumer protection rules for the digital economy was reasonable, particularly given that some existing legislation was created before many current online business models existed.
She questioned, however, whether the proposed Act would introduce genuinely new protections or add another layer of requirements to rules already covering consumer rights, privacy, artificial intelligence and digital platforms.
Other legal experts have also raised questions about how the legislation would work in practice.
Monika Zdzieborska, counsel in Clifford Chance’s technology and digital practice, identified three issues likely to shape negotiations: how the Act fits with existing EU legislation, whether consumers should have to disable potentially addictive features themselves or whether companies should turn them off by default, and whether different types of digital services should face the same requirements despite presenting different risks.
She also pointed to the relationship between the Digital Fairness Act and the proposed EU Kids Act, noting that decisions on children’s protection, addictive design and age verification could influence both legislative processes.
Consumer rights organisation European Digital Rights (EDRi) has welcomed the attention given to manipulative online practices but expressed concern about the proposed approach to addictive design.
Itxaso Domínguez de Olazábal, a policy officer at EDRi, argued that consumers should not carry the main responsibility for avoiding harmful digital features by having to find and activate an option to switch them off. In her view, companies should face stronger obligations to prevent manipulative design in the first place.
The Commission estimates that the proposed rules could save consumers €88.4 billion in financial losses between 2025 and 2035. When the value of time lost dealing with unfair online practices is included, it estimates annual benefits of €13.7 billion, compared with recurring business costs of approximately €678 million a year after accounting for overlaps between measures.
Despite the Commission’s projections, the proposal is not yet law. It must first be examined and negotiated by the European Parliament and EU member states before it can be adopted.
The outcome of those negotiations will determine how far the final legislation goes in changing the way online businesses handle subscriptions, advertising, pricing and digital product design. For consumers, the central issue is whether the new rules will make unfair online practices harder for companies to use, rather than simply giving users more options to avoid them.
