A Comparative Study of Consumer Trust in Major Digital Trade Agreements

Purpose Technological change has provided individual consumers with increased possibilities in participating in digital trade while the lack of consumer trust and confidence in digital trade prevents consumers from enjoying all the benefits of e-commerce. In this regard, it is necessary to search for means to protect the individual rights of consumers participating in digital trade with a sound assessment of digital trade agreements in terms of consumer trust. Design/Methodology/Approach Focusing particularly on the issue of consumer trust-building, this paper first discusses major consumer concerns for digital trade and specifies issues that embrace consumer trust-building within multilateral and regional trade agreements. It then conducts a comparative analysis of articles related to consumer trust in six major digital trade agreements and derives its policy implications. Findings In participating in digital trade, consumers have both general and stage-specific concerns. With slow progress at the WTO on e-commerce, articles related to digital trade are increasingly featuring in regional trade agreements (RTAs), including nine issues directly related to consumer trust: online consumer protection; personal information protection, unsolicited commercial electronic messages which means spam messages, domestic regulatory framework, transparency, cybersecurity, access to and use of the internet for electronic commerce. Research Implications By reviewing the six major digital trade agreements on nine issue areas of consumer trust, it is first found that all the agreements certainly share the significance of building consumer trust to facilitate digital trade. Second, the consensus of signatory countries on the five issues, such as online consumer protection, personal information protection, unsolicited commercial electronic messages, domestic regulatory framework, and cybersecurity, seems relatively easy to make since articles in those issues in six agreements are similar in their length and quality. To strengthen consumer trust internationally, in the form of multilateral or regional trade agreements, both e-commerce and competition chapters should cover the rules for digital trade. Domestically, it is necessary to find a way to regulate digital trade not only with domestic consumer law but also with the Monopoly Regulation and Fair Trade Act.