Consumer Protection in the Era of E-Commerce: Issues and Challenges

Today consumer law is facing various issues and challenges as a result of the rapid development of e-commerce and globalised trade. The growth of borderless marketing and technology has grown over the years. There is a wide choice for online shopping for both manufacturers and consumers. These multinational companies and other enterprises which are engaged in e-commerce attract a large number of consumers all over the world. The problem is that many people who go online shopping become victims because of false or misleading advertisements, defective products, fake deliveries of products, unsafe products, payment issues, security and privacy issues, unilateral contracts etc. However, there are national laws to deal with such an issue, but somehow it fails to protect victimised consumers because of poor implementation of laws due to jurisdictional issues. The theme of this paper is to examine whether the current national laws are sufficient to deal with commercial transactions that affect consumers in today’s era. The paper will identify the issues and problems of electronic contracts. It will do a comparative study in legislations of other jurisdictions to provide suggestions as to how and why existing laws governing electronic contracts are required to be reformed to meet the challenges faced by today’s population while dealing with online transactions. There is a high time to take action at a national and international forum.