I bought it because it was cheap, but the children’s products sold by ‘Alitemu’ contained 300 times the standard level of harmful substances.

While Chinese online shopping platforms are launching an ultra-low price offensive, consumer complaints are rising one after another.

Therefore, the Seoul Metropolitan Government conducted safety tests on children’s products sold on these platforms.

As a result, harmful substances significantly exceeding the standard were detected in half of the 22 tested.

This is reporter Song Seo-young’s report.

◀ Report ▶

Heaps of shoe decorations, so-called jibbitz.

Genuine products cost 5,000 to 6,000 won each, but AliExpress charges 1,000 won for 20 pieces.

You can also buy car sunshades with characters on them for around 1,000 won.

As Chinese shopping platforms such as Ali and Temu have launched price offensives, the number of domestic users has exceeded 17 million.

But dissatisfaction is also increasing.

Consumer damage consultations related to AliExpress nearly tripled from 228 in 2022 to 673 last year.

[김경미/서울시 공정경제담당관]
″In particular, in the case of Chinese platforms, quality complaints were found to be high, unlike other overseas platforms.″

Starting this month, the Seoul Metropolitan Government has begun safety testing on products sold at Ali and Temu every week by selecting products that are in high demand.

Ahead of Children’s Day, 22 types of children’s products were selected for inspection.

As a result, 11 products, half of them, contained hazardous substances that far exceeded the standard.

In particular, 7 out of 16 shoe ornaments and sunshades were found to contain more than 300 times the standard level of phthalate plasticizers, a harmful substance that causes infertility.

Additionally, some had lead content exceeding 33 times the standard.

The problem isn’t just the ingredients.

In Korea, such small parts must be made so that they cannot be separated to prevent swallowing accidents by children.

However, the items caught this time were not like that.

There were also products whose parts could break into pieces with even a small amount of force, which could lead to a suffocation accident.

[안혜리/소비자공익네트워크 사무국장]
″When purchasing children’s products through Ali and Temu, we believe it would be appropriate to accurately check for certification and not purchase extremely cheap products that fall outside the scope of normal transactions.″

Seoul plans to continuously disclose information such as inspection items, sales locations, and detected hazardous substances on the Seoul city website.

In addition, we decided to expand the scope of testing to various overseas platforms, including Ali and Temu.

This is Song Seo-young from MBC News.

Video coverage: Kwan-ho Lee / Video editing: Kwan-sun Kim / Photo provided by: Seoul City Hall