Unfair commercial practice: a fine of 4 million euros was imposed by the Antitrust on Poste Italiane.

According to the Competition Authority, Poste has "made the use of the Banco Posta and PostePay apps, installed on smartphones with Android operating systems, subject to the user's authorization to access the data on their smartphone, under penalty of blocking the apps themselves."

In the operative part of the decision published in the Weekly Bulletin, this conduct by Poste «starting from April 2024, is contrary to professional diligence and characterized by aggressive profiles, in violation of articles 20, 24 and 25 of the Consumer Code».

The procedure was started by reports received from some consumers. In particular, the Antitrust investigation revealed that the holders of Banco Posta and PostePay accounts who use the services via the related Apps on their smartphones with Android operating systems, had received the message "protect your device. In order to prevent potential fraud, Poste Italiane introduces a new security feature" when opening these Apps.

Then they were invited to click on the button "go to settings and authorize the Poste Italiane App to access the data to detect the presence of any malicious software. The feature is mandatory, activate it immediately. In the absence of such authorization you have a maximum number of 3 accesses after which you will no longer be able to access and operate the App", we read in the bulletin regarding the Poste practice.

According to the Antitrust, the practice also "conflicts with the duty of professional diligence prescribed in Article 20 of the Consumer Code, in light of the information asymmetry that characterizes the relationships between financial intermediaries and their clients."

(Unioneonline/E.Fr.)

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