The Environmental Protection Agency on Thursday urged eight tech companies, including Facebook and eBay, to stop unscrupulous retailers from selling fake coronavirus disinfectants on their platforms.
The phony products include items such as stickers that claim to disinfect the wearer; “Epidemic Prevention Chlorinating Tablets,” and “Virus Shut Out,” a lanyard with instructions in Japanese that claims to protect wearers from the novel coronavirus.
“Today, we are advising eight companies to take action against these dishonest dealers and immediately take these illegal products off of their sites,” EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler said in a statement.
In addition to Facebook and eBay, the eight companies notified are Alibaba, Shopify, Qoo10, JoyBuy.com, Wish.com and banggood.com.
Such scams have surged in the past two months as the virus spreads, prompting the Justice Department and EPA to announce April 3 that they would prosecute the sellers of fraudulent or unregistered products.
Under federal law, products that claim to kill or repel viruses and bacteria are considered pesticides and “must be registered with the EPA prior to distribution or sale,” the agency said.
“Unregistered disinfectants can put consumers at risk, as they may be ineffective against the virus that causes COVID-19,” said EPA Assistant Administrator Susan Bodine. “EPA is working hard to stop the sale of these illegal products. We also urge consumers to see EPA’s list of approved disinfectant products available on our website.”
The EPA lists more than 370 products that have qualified for use against COVID-19.
Last month, the EPA and U.S. Customs and Border Protection intercepted a shipment of the “Virus Shut Out” lanyards at ports in Honolulu and Guam, then reached out to Amazon to have the product removed from its website.
“Amazon has taken this step,” EPA said in a March 25 press release.
• Valerie Richardson can be reached at vrichardson@washingtontimes.com.
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