Your marketing manager has just launched a campaign with the slogan ‘the best offer on the market’. An influencer has posted without marking the content as advertising. The checkout has a hidden default upsell. Each of these situations can result in a fine of up to 10% of your company’s turnover, as well as personal liability of up to PLN 2 million for the person who approved the campaign.
Not because you intended to deceive a customer. Because no one checked where the line is.
In 2023, UOKiK imposed more than PLN 422 million in fines on businesses for practices infringing the collective interests of consumers. In 2024, the amount was nearly PLN 263 million. Amazon was fined PLN 31.85 million. Azagroup (Renee, Born2Be) was fined nearly PLN 15 million. Olimp Laboratories was fined more than PLN 5 million for covert influencer advertising.
Aggressive marketing and legal risk now go hand in hand. This article covers five areas where bold selling turns into a regulatory problem, and what you can do so that a campaign launches on time instead of ending in proceedings.
Key terms to know
Before looking at specific risks, let us clarify the terminology. Consumer protection rules use terms that may sound broad but have precise legal meanings.
| Term | What it means for your business |
|---|---|
| Unfair market practice | An act or omission contrary to good commercial practice that distorts a consumer’s purchasing decision. Legal basis: the Act on Counteracting Unfair Market Practices (UPNPR). |
| Misleading practice | A message that contains false information or omits information needed to make an informed decision, for example, hiding a service fee or stating an inflated ‘price before reduction’ (Articles 5 and 6 UPNPR). |
| Aggressive market practice | Conduct that uses pressure, coercion or manipulation and limits the consumer’s freedom of choice, for example, a hidden cancellation button or a fake countdown timer (Article 8 UPNPR). |
| Dark patterns (deceptive interfaces) | Interface elements deliberately designed to steer users towards a decision that is not in their interest, for example, automatically adding a product to a basket or selecting an upgrade by default. Recital 67 of the DSA defines them as practices that ‘distort or impair the ability of recipients to make autonomous and informed choices’. |
| Covert advertising | Advertising presented as a spontaneous opinion, for example, an influencer’s post without an ‘advertisement’ or ‘paid partnership’ label. |
| Greenwashing | Communication suggesting that a product or business is environmentally friendly without factual support, for example, an ‘eco’ claim without certification or ‘climate neutrality’ based solely on offsets. |
A UOKiK fine for infringing consumers’ collective interests can reach 10% of the trader’s annual turnover. A manager who allowed an infringement may face a personal fine of up to PLN 2 million.
Five areas where marketing becomes a legal risk
Dark patterns: when UX becomes manipulation
Since 2023, UOKiK has treated dark patterns as a separate category of infringements. The first decision in which the President of UOKiK expressly used this term was decision RKT-7/2023 concerning Natural Pharmaceuticals (5 September 2023). The company was fined PLN 5,196,840 and its management board president PLN 110,000.
The practice involved redirecting customers from an offer of a free supplement sample to a paid annual subscription. The messages looked almost identical, so users could not tell that they were clicking on a different offer. The company also referred to ‘over a million satisfied customers’ (a figure covering all the company’s customers, not a particular product) and alleged EFSA recommendations.
Further decisions confirmed this direction:
| Business | Practice | Fine |
|---|---|---|
| DUKA International | Automatically adding products customers did not order to the basket (‘sneak into basket’) | PLN 1,578,061 |
| Bak Drop (bigotka.pl, arkadie.pl) | A fake countdown timer that reset every day, together with hiding the intermediary’s role (dropshipping) | PLN 100,710 |
| eBilet | Drip pricing: displaying a lower price and adding a service fee only at the end | more than PLN 1,300,000 |
| Amazon EU SARL | False delivery-time information and countdowns suggesting that customers needed to buy quickly | PLN 31,850,141 |
The scale of the problem is significant. In the international ICPEN sweep, 642 websites were examined: 75.7% used at least one dark pattern, and 66.8% used two or more. In Poland, UOKiK examined 10 websites and found prohibited practices on half of them.
Where is the line? Recital 67 of the DSA lists conduct that the regulator considers prohibited:
- Repeatedly asking users to make a choice they have already made
- Making it substantially more burdensome to cancel a service than to select it
- Default settings that are difficult to change
- Presenting options in a non-neutral way, by visually emphasizing one option
- Confusing recipients through deceptive design of the available choices
At the same time, Recital 29 of the AI Act states that ‘common and legitimate commercial practices, for example in advertising, that comply with applicable law should not in themselves be considered harmful manipulative practices’. The line is crossed when an interface deliberately limits a user’s decision-making autonomy.
UOKiK is carrying out a project on ‘Detecting and combating dark patterns using artificial intelligence’. The tool analyzes website layouts, visual and textual elements, and source code. Automated e-commerce scans for manipulative patterns are a matter of time, not a distant scenario.
What to check in your e-commerce business:
- Is cancelling a subscription as easy as buying it?
- Does the basket contain products the user did not add?
- Do countdown timers reflect a genuine offer deadline?
- Do default settings (such as a selected upgrade or newsletter consent) require the user to take an active step?
- Does the price shown at the beginning of the purchase journey include all mandatory fees?
Price promotions after the Omnibus Directive: the lowest price in the last 30 days
Since 1 January 2023, the implementation of the Omnibus Directive has applied. Whenever you announce a price reduction, you must state the lowest price in the last 30 days before the reduction (Article 4(2) of the Price Information Act).
It sounds simple, but businesses make mistakes on a large scale. The Trade Inspection checked nearly 3,000 businesses; almost half had irregularities. It imposed 899 fines totalling more than PLN 1.2 million.
Typical mistakes include:
- Failing to show the lowest price in the 30 days before a promotion
- Using the wrong reference price, such as a ‘regular’ price instead of the actual lowest price in the last 30 days
- Presenting the reference price unclearly, in small print or in a way that is not visible on a mobile device
- ‘Never-ending promotions’: communicating a permanent reduction as an exceptional, time-limited offer
The last mistake cost Azagroup (Renee and Born2Be stores) PLN 14,910,599. The decision of 27 May 2025 concerned permanent promotions with countdown clocks that restarted as soon as they ended. Products might never have been offered at the prices used to calculate the discount. For context, 82% of respondents in a UOKiK survey said promotions influenced their choice of online store.
The CJEU judgment in Aldi Süd (2024) confirmed that a percentage reduction must be calculated from the lowest price in the last 30 days, not from a ‘regular’ or ‘recommended’ price.
Zalando and Temu received fines totalling nearly PLN 37 million (Zalando accounted for almost PLN 31 million) for infringements related to price and promotion presentation.
Checklist for your team:
| Item to check | Status |
|---|---|
| The lowest price in the last 30 days is visible for every reduction | ☐ |
| The reference price is the actual lowest price, not a ‘recommended’ price | ☐ |
| The percentage reduction is calculated from the lowest price in the last 30 days (CJEU judgment in Aldi Süd) | ☐ |
| Countdown timers reflect the actual end of the promotion | ☐ |
| The promotion terms are consistent with the advertising claims | ☐ |
| The presentation is legible on mobile devices | ☐ |
Contact us if you would like us to review your promotion terms and purchase journeys for Omnibus compliance before the Trade Inspection does.
Influencer marketing: the brand is responsible, not just the creator
Since 2022, UOKiK has actively enforced the requirement to label advertising content on social media. UOKiK’s recommendations (prepared with IAB Poland in September 2022) are not legally binding, but they indicate how the regulator interprets the rules.
Required labels include ‘advertisement’, ‘sponsored content’ or ‘paid partnership’, together with identification of the advertised brand. The label must be visible from the beginning, use a clear font, and be in the language of the profile.
The Olimp Laboratories case (August 2023) was a precedent that changed the rules of the game. The company paid influencers to feature its products on Instagram under supplied guidelines. Those guidelines provided for unclear labels that did not unambiguously identify the commercial nature of the content.
Fines:
| Party | Fine |
|---|---|
| Olimp Laboratories (brand) | more than PLN 5,000,000 |
| Piotr Lisek (influencer) | more than PLN 23,000 |
| Katarzyna Dziurska (influencer) | PLN 16,000 |
| Katarzyna Oleśkiewicz-Szuba (influencer) | PLN 5,000 |
The Court of Competition and Consumer Protection (SOKiK) dismissed Olimp Laboratories’ appeal in 2025 and confirmed that an advertiser is responsible for content commissioned from influencers. A producer cannot avoid liability by shifting it to the creator, particularly when the brand supplied publication guidelines.
In 2025, UOKiK fined companies associated with Filip Chajzer, Dorota Rabczewska and Małgorzata Rozenek-Majdan a total of nearly half a million zlotys.
What to implement in your business:
- Update influencer agreements with clauses on responsibility for correct content labelling
- Create publication briefs with labelling rules and concrete examples: ‘this format is OK’ and ‘this one needs correction’
- Set up a content approval procedure before publication
- Remember gifts: for the first gift, disclose that it is a gift; later gifts from the same brand should be labelled as advertising content
- Affiliate links always require an advertising label
Greenwashing: environmental claims under regulatory scrutiny
Do you describe your business as ‘eco-friendly’, ‘sustainable’ or ‘climate-neutral’? Check that you can substantiate those claims.
The Green Claims Directive (GCD), planned as a separate legal act, has not been adopted. In June 2025, the European Commission announced its intention to withdraw the legislative proposal because of concerns about excessive burdens on micro-enterprises.
That does not mean greenwashing is safe. Directive 2024/825/EU (ECGT) is in force. It was adopted on 28 February 2024, must be transposed by 27 March 2026, and is to apply from 27 September 2026. It expands the blacklist of prohibited practices to include:
- Generic environmental claims without evidence, such as ‘eco’, ‘green’ or ‘environmentally friendly’
- Climate-neutrality claims based solely on emissions compensation (offsets)
- Private ‘eco-labels’ without a certification system
- Presenting an environmentally friendly feature of part of a product as a feature of the whole product
- Claims about future environmental performance without a detailed plan with measurable milestones
In Poland, work is under way on draft bill UC111, which would amend the UPNPR and the Consumer Rights Act to implement Directive 2024/825.
UOKiK is already conducting proceedings against businesses over general environmental claims, including Bolt, Tchibo and Zara. The stated legal bases are Articles 5 and 6 UPNPR (misleading practices) and Article 24 of the Act on Competition and Consumer Protection.
How to organize ESG communications:
- Review all marketing materials for environmental claims
- Give every claim (‘eco’, ‘sustainable’, ‘climate-neutral’) a specific factual basis
- Remove or clarify generic statements. Instead of ‘we are eco-friendly’, say what you do and what data supports it
- If you communicate future goals, prepare a plan with measurable milestones
- Do not base climate-neutrality claims solely on offsets
Strong advertising claims: ‘best’, ‘cheapest’ and ‘guaranteed results’
‘The best offer on the market’ sounds good in a creative brief. It sounds less convincing in the reasoning of a UOKiK decision.
Misleading advertising is the most common basis for UOKiK proceedings in consumer protection. Jeronimo Martins Polska (the ‘anti-inflation Biedronka Shield’ promotion) paid PLN 160,923,767, the highest fine for infringing collective consumer interests in 2023. The allegation concerned misleading consumers about the promotion’s terms, benefits and availability of its rules.
Every marketing claim is assessed against the ‘average consumer’ model: a person who is reasonably well-informed, observant and circumspect (Supreme Court judgment of 2 October 2007, II CSK 289/07). If an average consumer could understand your message as a promise of a specific result, and you cannot prove that result, you have a problem.
Decision rule for the marketing team:
| Type of message | Does it require evidence? | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Absolute superlative (‘best’, ‘cheapest’) | Yes, you must prove it is true | ‘The cheapest hosting in Poland’ requires a comparison with every competitor |
| Subjective superlative or puffery (‘a beloved brand’) | No, if it is an obvious exaggeration | ‘Coffee you’ll love’ is permissible |
| Claim about a specific result (‘30% growth guaranteed’) | Yes, you need data | Research, tests, statistics |
| Comparative advertising (‘30% cheaper than X’) | Yes, the comparison methodology must be verifiable | Without verification, a competitor may sue under the Act on Combating Unfair Competition |
Who is responsible for a non-compliant campaign: the brand or the agency?
This question comes up in every UOKiK proceeding. The answer is: both.
The Act on Combating Unfair Competition (Articles 16 and 17) provides for cumulative liability of the advertiser and advertising agency. In its judgment of 9 April 2015 (II CSK 338/14), the Supreme Court confirmed that an advertiser cannot avoid liability by saying that an agency prepared the campaign (Article 429 of the Civil Code).
In a UOKiK decision concerning the ‘iPlus dla Ciebie z komputerem za złotówkę’ campaign (Vobis S.A.), the advertiser was fined PLN 177,034, even though an external party had prepared the creative.
| Party | What it is responsible for | Legal basis |
|---|---|---|
| Brand (advertiser) | The content and presentation of the advertisement, even if it commissioned an agency | Articles 16-17 of the Act on Combating Unfair Competition; Supreme Court judgment II CSK 338/14 |
| Advertising agency | Preparing an advertisement that violates the law | Articles 16-17 of the Act on Combating Unfair Competition |
| Manager approving the campaign | Personal liability for intentionally allowing an infringement | Article 106b of the Act on Competition and Consumer Protection: up to PLN 2 million |
The takeaway: an agency agreement does not protect you from a UOKiK fine. An internal campaign approval procedure with clear assignment of responsibility does.
Layered financial risk: cumulative penalty regimes
A business using aggressive digital marketing may breach rules under several regimes at once. Penalties may accumulate.
| Regulatory regime | Maximum penalty | Example of an infringement |
|---|---|---|
| Consumer protection (UOKiK) | Up to 10% of annual turnover | Dark patterns, false promotions, covert advertising |
| GDPR | Up to 4% of annual turnover or EUR 20 million | Profiling without a legal basis, failure to provide the right to object to direct marketing |
| DSA (for platforms) | Up to 6% of annual turnover | Deceptive interfaces on a platform |
| AI Act | Up to 7% of turnover or EUR 35 million | AI-based manipulative techniques that limit decision-making autonomy |
Recital 70 of the GDPR states that a data subject has the right to object at any time, free of charge, to the processing of personal data for direct marketing, including profiling. This right must be presented ‘clearly and separately from any other information’. If your newsletter cancellation form requires three clicks and a login, it is not ‘clear and separate’.
How to organize marketing without slowing campaigns
The goal is not to stop campaigns. It is to eliminate risks that could stop them through a regulator’s decision rather than your own.
Audit campaigns and marketing claims. Review current campaigns for statements such as ‘best’, ‘cheapest’, ‘guaranteed results’ and ‘eco’. Check that each is supported by evidence. Identify statements that need to be changed or removed.
Internal campaign approval checklist. Decide who checks claims, who accepts risk, and what the ‘stop / go / revise’ criteria are. Assign responsibility to named individuals, because if UOKiK opens proceedings, a personal fine of up to PLN 2 million applies to a specific person, not a ‘marketing department’.
Audit purchase journeys for dark patterns. Check checkout, subscriptions, renewals and cancellation procedures. Look for hidden costs, forced consents, difficult cancellation and manipulative default settings.
Organize influencer relationships. Update agreements with clauses on responsibility for content. Require advertising labels in line with UOKiK recommendations. Prepare publication briefs with concrete examples of correct labels.
Review ESG communications. Every environmental claim needs a specific factual basis. Remove or clarify generic statements. Prepare for the entry into force of rules implementing Directive 2024/825 (from 27 September 2026).
Approved claims library. Prepare ready-to-use, verified message variants that the team can use without seeking legal advice each time. This speeds up content production and reduces the risk of mistakes.
Team training. Not a lecture on the law, but a workshop using concrete examples: ‘this claim is OK’, ‘this needs a change’, ‘we do not publish this’.
How we can help
Consumer protection law, e-commerce regulations, influencer marketing and ESG communications are areas in which we work with technology businesses, e-commerce companies and consumer brands every day. We bring contract law, digital law and data protection together in a service model tailored to the pace of your business.
Our support includes:
- Campaign and purchase-journey audit: review of marketing claims, checkout, subscriptions and cancellation processes for dark patterns and Omnibus compliance
- Risk report with recommendations: a concrete list of what to improve, remove, or change in terms and conditions or an agreement
- Campaign approval checklist: who checks, who approves and what the ‘stop / go / revise’ criteria are
- Influencer relationship management: agreement templates, publication brief and content approval procedure
- ESG communication review: review of environmental claims and preparation for rules implementing Directive 2024/825
- Marketing team training: a workshop with examples tailored to your industry
We do not create documents ‘just in case’. We design rules where risk actually arises, at a pace that lets the campaign launch on time.
The line between boldness and risk is a procedure
Aggressive marketing is not prohibited. Marketing that manipulates or misleads consumers, or uses pressure against them, is prohibited. The line does not run through creativity. It runs through internal procedures: who checks claims, who audits the purchase journey, who approves the campaign and takes responsibility for it.
UOKiK fines are rising: more than PLN 422 million in 2023 and nearly PLN 263 million in 2024. UOKiK is implementing AI tools to scan e-commerce automatically. Directive 2024/825 will expand the blacklist of prohibited practices from September 2026. The time to organize your marketing is now, not after the first letter from the regulator.
Frequently asked questions
Can I say ‘the best on the market’ or ‘the cheapest’, and what happens if that is an exaggeration?
Absolute superlatives (‘best’, ‘cheapest’, ‘the only one’) require evidence. If you say ‘the cheapest hosting in Poland’, you must be able to prove that you compared prices with every competitor. Without that data, the claim may be classified as misleading advertising. The fine can be up to 10% of the company’s annual turnover, plus up to PLN 2 million for the person who approved the campaign. Subjective superlatives (so-called puffery) are permissible when the average consumer sees them as obvious exaggeration, for example, ‘coffee you’ll love’.
Who in a company is personally responsible for a campaign that violates consumer law: the CEO, CMO or agency?
Liability is cumulative. The brand (advertiser) is responsible for the advertising content even if it commissioned an agency, as confirmed by the Supreme Court (judgment of 9 April 2015, II CSK 338/14). The agency is responsible for preparing an unlawful advertisement. A personal fine of up to PLN 2 million applies to the specific manager who intentionally allowed the infringement, most often the person who approved the campaign. An agency agreement does not protect against a UOKiK fine.
What labels must influencers use, and what happens to my business if they do not?
UOKiK recommendations (September 2022) call for labels such as ‘advertisement’, ‘sponsored content’ or ‘paid partnership’, together with the brand name. The label must be visible from the beginning of the content. If an influencer does not label an advertisement, both the creator and the brand are responsible. SOKiK confirmed this in the Olimp Laboratories case (a fine of more than PLN 5 million for the company, judgment in 2025): a producer cannot shift responsibility to the influencer, especially when the brand supplied publication guidelines.
Where is the line between good UX and a dark pattern?
The line is where an interface deliberately limits the user’s decision-making autonomy. Recital 67 of the DSA lists specific prohibited practices: repeatedly asking users to make a choice already made, a burdensome cancellation process, default settings that are difficult to change, and presenting options in a non-neutral way. If your checkout selects an upgrade by default and hides the cancellation button behind three clicks, that is a dark pattern. If options are presented symmetrically and users choose for themselves, that is UX.
Are dark patterns a real problem in Poland?
Yes. UOKiK has fined Natural Pharmaceuticals (PLN 5.2 million), DUKA International (PLN 1.6 million), Amazon (PLN 31.85 million) and Azagroup (PLN 14.9 million) for manipulative interface practices. Since 2023, UOKiK has been running an AI project to detect dark patterns automatically in Polish online stores. In the ICPEN sweep, prohibited practices were found on half of the Polish websites examined.
How quickly can UOKiK respond? Do I have time to fix a campaign if someone reports a problem?
UOKiK may open explanatory proceedings on its own initiative or following a consumer notification. Explanatory proceedings last from several weeks to several months. In 2024, UOKiK opened 128 explanatory proceedings. There is no guarantee that correcting a campaign after a report will protect you from a fine. UOKiK assesses the practice from when it was used, not from when it stopped. It is therefore worth reviewing campaigns before a notification arrives.
