ANNEX

GUIDELINES FOR THE MANAGEMENT OF THE EUROPEAN UNION RAPID INFORMATION SYSTEM ‘RAPEX’ ESTABLISHED UNDER ARTICLE 12 OF DIRECTIVE 2001/95/EC (THE GENERAL PRODUCT SAFETY DIRECTIVE) AND ITS NOTIFICATION SYSTEM

PART IIEU RAPID INFORMATION SYSTEM ‘RAPEX’ ESTABLISHED UNDER ARTICLE 12 OF THE GENERAL PRODUCT SAFETY DIRECTIVE

3.Notifications

3.4.Workflow

3.4.6.Follow-up to notifications

3.4.6.3.Follow-up techniques

(d)Online checks

National authorities regularly perform online checks to try to identify whether products notified via RAPEX are available on online markets. Online check techniques may include web-crawling, data mining, data scraping, etc.

National authorities apply various follow-up techniques in parallel and ideally do not limit their activities to only one of them.

The Member State in which a manufacturer, a representative or an importer of the notified product is established (‘Main Member State’) ensures appropriate follow-up to notifications distributed through the RAPEX application. The ‘Main Member State’ often has better legal and technical means of obtaining information on the notified case, which will help other Member States to undertake effective follow-up activities.