Today the European Court of Justice (ECJ) decided in the case C-191/15 (Verein für Konsumenteninformation vs Amazon EU Sàrl). The ruling sheds light on some interesting questions with regard to consumer protection law and also assesses the European data protection rules on applicable law.

With regard to consumer protection, the case concerned potentially unfair terms in the terms of use of Amazon EU, a company established in Luxembourg. The ECJ clarified that the law applicable to the examination of the unfairness of terms in consumer contracts which are the subject of an action for an injunction (in this case by Verein für Konsumenteninformation) must be determined independently from the law applicable to the action of injunction itself. National courts might therefore face a situation where they would have to assess the unfairness of certain clauses in terms of use on the basis of the law of another Member State. This result is though not entirely surprising but is now affirmed by the ECJ in a case considering e-commerce.
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