Chinese online retailer Temu has been fined $232 million by European Union regulators for failing to stop the sale of toxic toys and unsafe electronics on its platform.
The 200 million euro ($232 million) penalty was announced Thursday after a nearly two-year investigation under the EU's Digital Services Act, which sets strict rules for large online platforms.
Officials said Temu did not do enough to prevent illegal and dangerous products, including hazardous children's toys and non-compliant electronics, from reaching consumers across the 27-nation bloc, according to ABC News.
The European Commission said the case is part of a broader crackdown on online marketplaces that fail to protect users from harmful goods.
Investigators conducted a series of "mystery shopping" tests on Temu, finding baby toys with chemicals above legal limits and items with detachable parts that posed choking or suffocation risks.
Regulators also reported unsafe chargers and other small electronics that did not meet EU safety standards or carried inadequate warnings. Many of the flagged products were marketed with misleading labels or incomplete safety information, making it harder for buyers to judge the risks.
The Commission concluded that Temu failed to properly identify, assess, and mitigate systemic risks associated with the sale of illegal products through its marketplace.
Under the Digital Services Act, very large platforms must deploy effective tools to trace high-risk traders, act quickly on dangerous listings, and give consumers clear ways to flag unsafe goods. Authorities said Temu's risk assessment procedures and response mechanisms did not meet these requirements.
Temu, which is owned by PDD Holdings and has an estimated 92 million users in the EU, now has until late August to submit a detailed action plan showing how it will comply with the law, Yahoo Finance reported.
Regulators said they will review the plan and decide within about two months whether Temu's measures are sufficient or whether additional penalties are needed. The fine is the second major enforcement action under the Digital Services Act, following the EU's 120 million-euro fine against social media platform "X" last year.
Temu has previously faced regulatory pressure in other markets, including a $2 million U.S. civil penalty in 2025 over alleged violations of the INFORM Consumers Act related to transparency around sellers and potentially unsafe or counterfeit goods.
Consumer advocates say the EU case highlights growing global concerns about the safety of low-cost products sold through fast-growing online marketplaces, as per Justice.
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