Distributes a software product, in Belgium

Burgerlijk Wetboek, boek 6, artikelen 6.41 tot 6.55 · Read the law's page

• Do not assume this regime answers whether standalone software is a product: Book 6 defines a product as a corporeal movable good, joined to another movable or immovable good or not, adds electricity, and does not name software (Art. 6.42).
• If you make a finished product, a component part or a raw material, or put your name, trade mark or another distinguishing sign on a product so as to present yourself as its maker, you answer as its producer for the damage a defect in it causes (Arts. 6.41 and 6.43).
• If you import a product into the European Union in the course of your economic activities to sell it or transfer its use to a third party, you answer like the producer (Art. 6.44, first paragraph).
• If you supply a product and the producer (or, for an imported product, the importer) cannot be identified, you are treated as the producer unless you tell the injured person within a reasonable time who the producer or importer is, or who supplied the product to you (Art. 6.44, second paragraph).
• Judge each release against the safety people are entitled to expect in all the circumstances, among them how the product is presented, its normal or reasonably foreseeable use and the time you put it into circulation; a later, better product does not make the earlier one defective (Art. 6.45).
• Be able to prove a defense, because the injured person need prove only the damage, the defect and the causal link: that you did not put the product into circulation, that the defect probably did not exist then or arose later, that the product was not made for sale or distribution with an economic purpose or in the course of your profession, that the defect results from compliance with mandatory rules of the public authorities, or that scientific and technical knowledge when you put it into circulation made the defect impossible to discover (Arts. 6.47 and 6.48(a) to (e)).
• If you make a component or a raw material, keep the design and instruction records of the product it went into: you are excused if the defect is due to that product's design or to its producer's instructions (Art. 6.48(f)).
• Answer jointly with every other person liable under this section for the same damage, subject to rights of recourse (Art. 6.49).
• Do not rely on a contract term to limit or exclude your liability to the injured person; the liability can be limited or excluded where the injured person's own fault, or that of a person they answer for, contributed to the damage, but not where a third party's act did (Art. 6.50).
• Plan for claims for personal injury, moral damage included, and for damage to goods of a type normally intended for private use or consumption that the injured person mainly used that way; damage to the defective product itself is not compensated, and compensation for damage to goods is due only above a deductible of five hundred euros (Art. 6.51).
• Plan for the injured person's right to compensation to be extinguished ten years after you put the product into circulation unless proceedings were brought within that period, and for the action to prescribe three years after the injured person reasonably should have known the damage, the defect and the producer's identity (Art. 6.52).
• Do not treat this section as the whole of your exposure: it leaves the injured person's rights under the law of contractual and extra-contractual liability untouched (Art. 6.53).

Decreet van 27 maart 2009 betreffende radio-omroep en televisie, artikel 214/2 en bijlagen 1 tot 3 (Vlaamse Gemeenschap) · Read the law's page

• If you place on the market from 28 June 2025 terminal equipment with interactive computing capability for access to television services, it must meet Sections 1 and 2 of Annex 1 to the Flemish Media Decree (Article 214/2(1)).
• If you provide services that give access to television services to consumers from 28 June 2025, they must meet Sections 3 and 4 of Annex 1 (Article 214/2(2)).
• Prepare the information required by Annex 2, explain how your access services meet the applicable accessibility requirements, make it available to the public in writing and orally, including in a way accessible to persons with disabilities, and keep it for as long as the service operates (Article 214/2(2)).
• Micro-enterprises, meaning enterprises with fewer than ten employees and an annual turnover or annual balance sheet total of at most EUR 2 million, that offer those access services are exempt from the requirements and from every obligation relating to compliance with them (Articles 2, point 21°/0, and 214/2(2)).
• The requirements apply only to the extent that compliance does not require a significant change resulting in a fundamental alteration of the nature of the terminal equipment or service and does not impose a disproportionate burden; assess this on the Annex 3 criteria, document the assessment, keep the results for five years after the equipment or service was last made available, and give the Flemish Regulator for the Media a copy on request (Article 214/2(3)).
• Providers of access services that rely on the disproportionate burden exception renew the assessment when the service changes, at the regulator's request, and at least every five years, and providers other than micro-enterprises tell the regulator when they rely on the exception for a specific terminal or service (Article 214/2(3)).
• You cannot rely on the disproportionate burden exception if you receive public or private funding, other than your own resources, to improve accessibility (Article 214/2(4)).
• Until 28 June 2030 providers of access services may keep using the terminals they lawfully used before that date, and service contracts concluded before 28 June 2025 may run unchanged for no more than five years from that date (Article 214/2(5)).

Decreet van 29 maart 2024 over e-boeken en bijbehorende software (Vlaamse Gemeenschap) · Read the law's page

• If you provide e-books, that is digital book files with the software, including mobile applications, needed to open, browse, read and use them, in the Flemish Community, e-books you place on the market from 28 June 2025 must meet Sections 1 and 2 of Annex 1 to the decree of 29 March 2024 (Articles 3, point 2, and 4(2)).
• Prepare the information Annex 2 requires, explain how the service meets the accessibility requirements, make it available to the public in writing and orally in a way accessible to persons with disabilities, and keep it as long as the service operates (Article 4(2)).
• Micro-enterprises that offer the services are exempt from the requirements and from every obligation relating to compliance with them (Article 4(2)).
• The requirements apply only where compliance requires no fundamental alteration of the e-book and imposes no disproportionate burden; assess this on the Annex 3 criteria, document the assessment, keep the results for five years, give the administration a copy on request, renew a burden assessment when the service changes, on request and at least every five years, and, unless you are a micro-enterprise, tell the administration when you rely on the exception (Article 4(3)).
• You cannot rely on the disproportionate burden exception if you receive public or private funding, other than your own resources, to improve accessibility (Article 4(4)).
• Until 28 June 2030 you may keep providing the service with products you lawfully used before that date, and service contracts concluded before 28 June 2025 may run unchanged until 27 June 2030 at the latest (Article 4(5)).

Décret du 24 avril 2025 relatif aux exigences en matière d'accessibilité des livres numériques (Communauté française) · Read the law's page

• If you publish, distribute or sell e-books in the French Community, the decree of 24 April 2025 applies to e-books placed on the market from 28 June 2025, and from 28 June 2030 to e-books placed on the market before 28 June 2025 (Articles 2, point 5, and 7).
• If you publish e-books, make them meet Sections 1 and 2 of Annex I, prepare the information Annex II requires and make it available in writing and orally, including in a way accessible to persons with disabilities, keep procedures that keep the service conforming, correct a non-conformity, tell the Administration at once and cooperate with it (Article 3(1)).
• Micro-enterprises that publish e-books are exempt from the requirements and from all obligations relating to compliance with them, counting only the book-publishing part of a business with several activities (Article 3(2)).
• If you distribute e-books, receive, store and send on the publishers' files without compromising their accessibility features or changing their metadata (Article 3(3)).
• If you sell e-books to consumers, store and supply the files without compromising their accessibility features and pass on faithfully the metadata on their accessibility features (Article 3(4)).
• The requirements apply only to the extent that compliance does not require a fundamental alteration of the e-book and does not impose a disproportionate burden; tell the Administration when you rely on this, assess it on the Annex III criteria, support the assessment with evidence, keep the results for five years, give the Administration a copy on request, and renew a burden assessment when the service changes, on request and at least every five years (Article 4(1) to (3)).
• You cannot rely on the disproportionate burden exception if you receive funding other than your own resources, public or private, to improve accessibility (Article 4(4)).

Loi du 13 juin 2005 relative aux communications électroniques, article 38/1, inséré par la loi du 20 juillet 2023, et Koninklijk besluit van 13 september 2023 houdende wijziging van het koninklijk besluit van 25 maart 2016 betreffende het op de markt aanbieden van radioapparatuur · Read the law's page

• If you hold, market, import or own radio equipment that is general-purpose consumer computer hardware and its operating systems, a self-service payment terminal, bank machine, ticketing machine or check-in machine, an interactive information terminal, consumer terminal equipment for electronic communications services or for access to audiovisual media services, or an e-reader, the accessibility requirements that the Royal Decree of 13 September 2023 inserts into the Royal Decree of 25 March 2016 apply to it from 28 June 2025 (Article 38/1(1) of the Law and Article 25 of the decree).
• Design and produce the radio equipment so as to maximise its foreseeable use by persons with disabilities, and accompany it, where possible in or on the equipment, with accessible information on how it works and on its accessibility features (Article 3/1 of the Royal Decree of 25 March 2016).
• The requirements apply only to the extent that compliance does not require a significant change resulting in a fundamental alteration of the nature of the equipment and does not impose a disproportionate burden on manufacturers, authorised representatives, importers and distributors under the criteria the King fixes (Article 38/1(1)).
• Assess whether compliance has one of those effects, support the assessment with evidence, keep all relevant results for five years from the last placing of the equipment on the market, and give the Institute a copy on request (Article 38/1(1)).
• An enterprise with fewer than ten employees and an annual turnover or annual balance sheet total of at most EUR 2,000,000 that is active in radio equipment is exempt from supporting its assessment with evidence, but gives the Institute the relevant facts if it asks (Article 38/1(1)).
• You cannot rely on the disproportionate burden exception if you receive public or private funding, other than your own resources, to improve accessibility (Article 38/1(2)).
• If the Institute finds that the equipment does not meet the accessibility requirements, take the corrective measures it orders within the period it sets, or withdraw the equipment from the market within the further period it sets if you do not (Article 26(1/1) of the Royal Decree of 25 March 2016).

Dekret vom 1. März 2021 über die Mediendienste und die Kinovorstellungen, Artikel 100, 139 §1 und Anhänge 1 und 2 (Deutschsprachige Gemeinschaft) · Read the law's page

• If you place on the market after 28 June 2025 consumer terminal equipment with interactive computing capability used to access audiovisual media services, or e-readers, it must meet Sections I and IV of Annex 1 to the Decree of the German-speaking Community on media services (Article 100(1)).
• If you provide to consumers after 28 June 2025 services that give access to audiovisual media services, or e-books, they must meet Sections II and III, or Section IV, of Annex 1 (Article 100(2)).
• Microenterprises that offer services are exempt from the requirements for services and from all obligations relating to compliance with them (Article 100(2)).
• The requirements apply only to the extent that compliance does not require a significant change resulting in a fundamental alteration of the product or service and does not impose a disproportionate burden; assess this on the Annex 2 criteria, document the assessment, keep the results for five years after the product was last made available or the service last provided, and give the Media Council or the competent authority a copy on request (Article 100(3)).
• You cannot rely on the disproportionate burden exception if you receive public or private funding, other than your own resources, to improve accessibility (Article 100(4)).

Koninklijk besluit van 1 oktober 2023 betreffende de toegankelijkheidsvoorschriften voor producten · Read the law's page

• If you manufacture, import or distribute any of the following products that are not radio equipment as Article 2, point 42, of the Law of 13 June 2005 defines it, and it is placed on the market after 28 June 2025, the Royal Decree of 1 October 2023 applies to you: general-purpose consumer computer hardware, payment terminals, cash machines, ticketing machines, check-in machines, interactive information self-service terminals, consumer terminal equipment for electronic communications services or for access to audiovisual media services, and e-readers (Article 3(1)).
• Place on the market only products that meet Section I of Annex 1 and, unless the product is a self-service terminal, Section II of Annex 1 (Article 4).
• Manufacturers must design and manufacture products in accordance with the requirements, draw up the technical documentation and carry out the conformity assessment under Annex 2, draw up an EU declaration of conformity and affix the CE marking, keep the documentation and the declaration for five years, and have procedures that keep series production conforming (Article 5(1) to (4)).
• Manufacturers must mark the product with an identifier, their name and contact address, and supply instructions and information in a language easy to understand for consumers and end users (Article 5(5) to (7)).
• A manufacturer that believes a product does not conform must take corrective measures at once or withdraw it, tell the market surveillance authorities with the nature of the non-conformity and the measures taken, keep a register of non-conforming products and complaints, and give the authorities on request the information and documentation they need (Article 5(8) and (9)).
• A manufacturer may appoint an authorised representative by written mandate, but cannot delegate the Article 5(1) duty or the drawing up of the technical documentation, and the representative keeps the EU declaration of conformity and the technical documentation for five years and cooperates with the authorities (Article 6).
• Affix the CE marking visibly, legibly and indelibly on the product, data plate, packaging or accompanying documents, before the product is placed on the market, in accordance with Article 30 of Regulation (EC) No 765/2008 (Articles 14 and 15(1) and (2)).
• Importers must place only conforming products on the market, check before doing so that the manufacturer carried out the conformity assessment and drew up the technical documentation and that the product bears the CE marking, keep a copy of the EU declaration of conformity for five years, and tell the manufacturer and the authorities of non-conformity (Article 7).
• Distributors must act with due care, check the CE marking, documents and instructions before making a product available, keep storage and transport conditions that preserve conformity, and tell the authorities of non-conformity (Article 8).
• An importer or distributor that places a product on the market under its own name or trademark, or modifies a product already on the market so that conformity may be affected, has the manufacturer's obligations (Article 9).
• Tell the market surveillance authorities on request which operator supplied you with a product and to which operator you supplied it, for five years after supply (Article 10).
• The requirements apply only to the extent that compliance does not require a significant change resulting in a fundamental alteration of the nature of the product and does not impose a disproportionate burden; assess this on the Annex 3 criteria, document the assessment, keep the results for five years after the product was last made available, and give the authorities information on request (Article 11(1) to (3) and (6)).
• On a reasoned request the market surveillance authorities may exempt a micro-enterprise from the duty to document the assessment, and you cannot rely on the disproportionate burden exception if you receive public or private funding, other than your own resources, to improve accessibility (Article 11(4) and (5)).
• If you rely on the exception, say in the EU declaration of conformity which accessibility requirements it covers (Article 13(1)).
• A product that meets harmonised standards, or parts of them, published in the Official Journal of the European Union is presumed to conform to the requirements to the extent the standards cover them (Article 12).

Avant-projet de loi modifiant les dispositions du Code civil relatives à la responsabilité du fait des produits défectueux, et insérant l’article 877/1 dans le Code judiciaire · Read the law's page

• Answer for a defective product under the Civil Code provisions on liability for defective products, which the draft amends; the draft also inserts Article 877/1 into the Judicial Code.