Amazon<\/a>, eBay, Etsy, OnBuy and TikTok Shop. The investigation found that every one of these platforms was allowing multiple items to be sold that could put an infant\u2019s life at risk.<\/p>\nAlmost a quarter of the products were on Amazon, which Which? said presented itself as an industry leader in detecting unsafe goods.<\/p>\n
Sue Davies, the head of consumer protection policy at Which?, said: \u201cThe lives of babies are at risk because these platforms won\u2019t stop dangerous products from reaching their customers \u2026 We\u2019ve shown how easy it is to find these unsafe products, so it\u2019s impossible to take companies as powerful as Amazon or eBay at their word when they claim safety is a top priority.\u201d<\/p>\n
Which? is urging ministers to use new powers under the Product Regulation and Metrology Act to make online marketplaces legally responsible for third-party products, with tough penalties for those that fail.<\/p>\n
The research focused on products that had been subject to safety alerts or product safety notices from the Office for Product Safety and Standards (OPSS).<\/p>\n
The consumer group found 54 self-feeding devices across Alibaba, Amazon, eBay, OnBuy and TikTok Shop, despite an OPSS alert issued in 2022 warning that they create a risk of serious injury or death. The products allow babies to bottle-feed without constant supervision, increasing the risk of choking or aspiration pneumonia if milk enters the lungs. Because choking is often silent, even nearby parents may not realise that a baby is in distress.<\/p>\n
Of the 150 products, 21 were pillow bottle-holders, designed to fasten around a baby\u2019s neck.<\/p>\n
Which? also identified 37 sleep pillows marketed for infants under 12 months across AliExpress, Amazon, Etsy, OnBuy and TikTok Shop. Many used terms such as \u201cnewborn\u201d or \u201cinfant\u201d or showed babies using the products in cots.<\/p>\n
Sleeping bags with a hood or without arm holes pose a suffocation risk and should not be sold, Which? says<\/p>\n
The OPSS issued a warning in December 2025 that sleep pillows marketed for babies under one year old posed risks of suffocation and overheating, which can lead to serious injury or death and have been associated with sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS).<\/p>\n
Which? found 59 baby sleeping bags across Alibaba, AliExpress, Amazon, eBay and Etsy that it believes pose a serious suffocation risk because they include hoods, and lack arm holes, or both. Which? said the products did not meet British Standards Institution safety requirements and should not be sold.<\/p>\n
Thirty-eight of those sleeping bags were listed on Etsy, including one knitted hooded sleeping bag without arm holes that was pictured covering a baby\u2019s mouth and nose. Many were marketed as \u201cbunny-style\u201d sleeping bags.<\/p>\n
Alibaba.com said it \u201cswiftly removed the non-compliant products on our platform\u201d and would continue to \u201ceducate sellers\u201d. AliExpress removed the flagged products and would make \u201cnecessary enhancements to our existing control measures to further reduce the risk of non-compliant product listings\u201d reappearing.<\/p>\n
An Etsy spokesperson said safety was \u201cparamount\u201d and that it \u201cremoved all the flagged policy-violating listings\u201d.<\/p>\n
One swaddle blanket dispatched by Amazon was marketed for babies aged up to six months and featured a hood with teddy ears but no arm holes. The listing said it could be used as a sleeping sack. Which? reported the same product, in a different colour, to Amazon this year.<\/p>\n
An Amazon spokesperson said: \u201cParents trust Amazon because we take customers\u2019 safety incredibly seriously, particularly when it comes to babies and infants. It\u2019s why we prohibit certain products \u2026 We\u2019ve removed the products highlighted by Which? while we investigate.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Product Regulation and Metrology Act, which came into force last July, gives ministers powers to impose product safety requirements on online marketplaces through secondary legislation. Which? said the measures had yet to be introduced and urged the government to act quickly to prevent dangerous products reaching UK consumers.<\/p>\n
A spokesperson for OnBuy said safety was a top priority and that it had removed all products before any sales.<\/p>\n
Ebay said it used technology, AI and expert teams \u201cto help keep unsafe items off the site\u201d. It added: \u201cTwo of the items identified by Which? had already been removed before they contacted us. We have now removed the remaining four items and carried out a wider check.\u201d
TikTok Shop said it had also removed flagged products, with notices issued to customers. \u201cTikTok has policies and processes in place to protect customers, including policies on what can and can\u2019t be sold,\u201d it said. The platform claims that more than 99.5% of non-compliant products are removed proactively, before listing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Babies are being put at risk by dozens of potentially lethal infant products sold to UK parents on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":530657,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[114,85,46],"class_list":["post-530656","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-il","tag-israel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/530656","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=530656"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/530656\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/530657"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=530656"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=530656"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=530656"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}