AliExpress under the microscope of the European Commission. The Chinese company faces a heavy penalty

Member Thierry Breton visits Beijing on Wednesday. Just a day earlier, an official announced that the European Union had called on one of the Chinese giants, AliExpress, to “share information on the platform’s activities protecting consumers against illegal products distributed online, including medicines,” informs Paulina Uznańska, an expert on China-European Union relations in Center for Eastern Studies.

The European Commission is investigating AliExpress

AliExpress has until November 27 to respond. Its content may determine whether the EC decides to initiate proceedings against . The basis is to be the legal act on digital services, which “does not only concern hate speech, disinformation and cyberbullying. Its task is also to remove illegal or dangerous products sold in the EU via e-commerce platforms, including the growing number of fake and potentially life-threatening and pharmaceuticals sold online” – .

What will AliExpress be at risk if the European Commission doesn’t like their answers? As Uznańska calculates, the EC can:

• impose a fine on AliExpress of up to 6%. the company’s annual global turnover,
• place the platform under increased supervision,
• as a last resort, temporarily suspend/limit access to AliExpress (however, the path to this is long and leads through the courts of Member States).

AliExpress suspected of espionage

In October, information appeared that . The case was investigated by the Belgian intelligence service due to suspicions that the government may be using the presence of Chinese companies on the Old Continent to collect information sensitive to state security.

The Belgians focused on controlling the Chinese company’s logistics center for cargo in Liège, in the east of the country. One of the main points of interest of the services is “software collecting sensitive economic information” allegedly used by the company.