FTC Welcomes Revised OECD Guidelines for E-commerce

The Federal Trade Commission welcomed the issuance by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) of new, revised guidelines for protecting consumers in e-commerce. The guidelines are designed to strengthen consumers’ trust in the expanding electronic marketplace.

The original 1999 e-commerce guidelines established a set of principles developed in cooperation with all the OECD countries. The revised guidelines announced today are designed to address the newest developments in e-commerce, such as services that are exchanged for consumer data, mobile transactions and payments, and new platforms that enable consumer-to-consumer transactions. They form part of the OECD’s trust agenda, to be addressed at the upcoming June OECD Ministerial on the Digital Economy.

The United States is a founding member of the OECD, an international forum established more than 50 years ago, in which market economies committed to democracy promote policies to improve the economic and social well-being of people around the world. The FTC serves as the lead U.S. agency for the OECD’s Committee on Consumer Policy, which led the e-commerce guidelines revision process.

More information about the FTC’s international program is available here.