Consumer Trust in Electronic Commerce: Time for Best Practice

This multi-disciplinary book provides insight in how to establish consumer trust in electronic commerce. It first goes into detail on a broad variety of consumer trust criteria with regard to the security and reliability of electronic consumer transactions, what information must be provided to consumers, how to create a legally binding contract online, confidence in electronic payments, the resolution of disputes, what law applies to the electronic consumer contract, which body is entitled to settle the dispute and personal data protection. By means of these criteria it is assessed into what extent consumer trust is ensured by the application of a public-key infrastructure, which supports cryptographic services such as electronic signatures and encryption. An assessment is also made on the European Union cryptography policy and the European Union policy on consumer protection in electronic commerce. In addition, a wide range of co-regulation and self-regulation initiatives within the European Union and Northern America are assessed. Finally, this book provides a consumer trust framework which learns that various ingredients at different levels are required to build consumer trust in electronic commerce. As such, it clarifies the roles and responsibilities of government, industry and consumer organisations, businesses, as well as consumers themselves.