
Carbon monoxide alarms removed from Amazon and eBay after failing safety tests - pmoriarty
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/carbon-monoxide-alarms-withdrawn-fail-safety-tests-which-amazon-ebay-a8410941.html
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alphabettsy
I noticed that Amazon seems to have some serious issues with counterfeit
product. For them to compete long-term with companies like Walmart and Best
Buy they need to do better and this is another example of where sometimes a
curated product selection can be better.

~~~
BinaryIdiot
Yes! For example I wanted to purchase Stranger Things Season 2 box set for a
family member who has poor access to the internet. If you search for it on
Amazon it looks legit but then you notice something odd. Zero retailers
actually carry this. Only Amazon and eBay.

Turns out it's completely counterfeit. Worst yet I reported it and nothing
happened to it and last I checked it's listed as "Amazon's Choice". They are
still selling these.

Amazon seems perfectly fine with selling counterfeit products and it's quite
frustrating.

~~~
dzhiurgis
> Amazon seems perfectly fine with selling counterfeit products and it's quite
> frustrating.

Does paying amazon counterfeit money makes it any less illegal? Asking for a
friend.

~~~
lotsofpulp
As far as I know, Amazon doesn't touch cash so...

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flak48
They do in India (Cash on delivery). And there's a small but growing
counterfeit listings problem here too.

~~~
lotsofpulp
Interesting, didn't know that!

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Animats
One of the most useful things the administration could do to limit imports
from China is to require UL certification on anything that plugs in or has a
safety related function. That would filter out a huge amount of junk.

~~~
AstralStorm
Not just require. Actually verify if the certification is valid. There are
many products with counterfeit UL logo.

~~~
xnyan
I work at UL, some fakes are so well done it can be difficult even for people
who are experts. Check out page 3: [https://library.ul.com/wp-
content/uploads/sites/40/2016/09/1...](https://library.ul.com/wp-
content/uploads/sites/40/2016/09/10314-CounterfeitiPhone-WP-HighRes_FINAL.pdf)

~~~
Animats
Yes. Solid state relays are widely counterfeited. Especially Fotek. Here's an
obvious counterfeit on Amazon[1] This is supposed to be a 100 amp solid state
relay. Fotek doesn't even make a 100 amp relay in that form factor - the screw
terminals are not big enough for 100 amps. The real Fotek makes nothing bigger
than 40A in that packaging.[2]

Here's a teardown of some fakes.[3] The fakes are way overloaded - they have
the parts for a much lower current device inside. Also, the higher current
ones need a heat sink, which the counterfeit ones don't provide.

These things tend to show up in "internet of Things" devices, because they can
switch considerable power from a logic level input.

UL's warning page on this.[4]

[1] [https://www.amazon.com/Industrial-Relay-Protective-
SSR-100DA...](https://www.amazon.com/Industrial-Relay-Protective-SSR-100DA-
control/dp/B017W7N7F)

[2] [http://www.fotek.com.hk/page1e.htm](http://www.fotek.com.hk/page1e.htm)

[3] [http://www.instructables.com/id/The-inner-workings-of-
Counte...](http://www.instructables.com/id/The-inner-workings-of-Counterfeit-
FOTEK-SSRs/)

[4] [https://www.ul.com/newsroom/publicnotices/ul-warns-of-
solid-...](https://www.ul.com/newsroom/publicnotices/ul-warns-of-solid-state-
relay-with-counterfeit-ul-recognition-mark-release-13pn-52/)

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eh78ssxv2f
What prevents the manufacturer from rebranding themselves and listing their
products again on Amazon? I really hope Amazon takes some proactive steps
here, otherwise, people would lose trust in Amazon products and ratings.

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londons_explore
I have that exact model of alarm, purchased for $2.50 from eBay.

Seeing this report, I decided to test it, and have taken a few barbeque coals
smouldering and left them near the alarm.

The alarm goes off within about 1 minute, and the screen shows first 25, then
"50ppm" of carbon monoxide.

I also tested the behaviour with a low battery, and it does indeed warn you.

Overall, it seems to be working as advertised - I can only suspect that not
_all_ of this model of alarm are bad, or perhaps that the british standards
have some strict requirements (like perhaps it needs to go off quicker than 1
minute).

For the $2.50, the safety per dollar seems like the best deal around, and it
is still way better than not having an alarm.

If anyone else tries this, beware that once the alarm has gone off, it keeps
beeping for about an hour, even after you remove the carbon monoxide...

~~~
mannykannot
I am glad that yours seem to be effective, but having a price of $2.50 seems
to be an awfully small factor in deciding which CO alarm to buy.

~~~
londons_explore
My appliances don't burn anything in the room atmosphere, so I don't really
need an alarm at all.

For $2.50, it seemed worth getting anyway (just incase someone is an idiot and
brings the lit barbequeue indoors or something), but wouldn't have been worth
it in my eyes for $10.

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coaxial
You would be well advised to never ever get anything you depend on from
Amazon, especially not things to protect lives or ensure safety.

Amazon has an incredible problem with counterfeits, but also with quality
control: they often will sell you items that have been used and returned by
customers as new and never used.

You can't even rely on the reviews because sellers routinely game the system
and flood their listings with fake or bought 5 star reviews. Oftentimes, when
I publish a 1 star review, the seller will reach out and ask me to change my
review to 5 star in exchange for another free product of theirs. Many people
bite.

I personally quit buying anything at all from Amazon for that reason, instead
I find the item locally and price match if the store allows. Even if you
report it, the underpaid customer service agent only seems to have one
incentive: number of cases handled by hour. Don't expect much when reporting
counterfeit or unsafe products, they'll say amazon cares, thank you, it will
be forwarded to whoever. It might as well go to /dev/null because nothing ever
happens.

It eludes me how amazon (the retailer) plans on staying in business in the
long term while behaving this way.

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black6
Along the same lines, you shouldn’t buy your average smoke detector online,
either. The radioisotopes used in the detector mechanism necessarily have a
half-life, and it behooves you to check the manufactured/expiration date on
the packaging before purchase.

~~~
makomk
Cheap smoke detectors are pretty much all optical these days, and even the
unbranded £2 Chinese ones have pretty sophisticated self-tests:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uzKAZCKjpU8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uzKAZCKjpU8)

To be honest, I'm not sure whether there's even any point having expiration
dates on modern photoelectric detectors, except as a way to sell more smoke
alarms.

~~~
AstralStorm
There is an expiration date on the battery which should be listed.

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mrleiter
Which? apparently is a paid service. That I find morally questionable -
telling you that some are literally deadly and then asking for money to tell
you which ones are.

~~~
Hates_
You do not have to pay money to see which ones are deadly. You can see all the
safety alert information on which ones are unsafe on the product listings[1]
as well as individual product pages[2]. I've been involved in the product
safety work at Which? and they've gone to great pains to make sure that this
was publically and easily available information. They are also running a huge
campaign on product safety[3].

[1] [https://www.which.co.uk/reviews/carbon-monoxide-
detectors](https://www.which.co.uk/reviews/carbon-monoxide-detectors)

[2] [https://www.which.co.uk/reviews/carbon-monoxide-
detectors/un...](https://www.which.co.uk/reviews/carbon-monoxide-
detectors/unbranded-and-dangerous-carbon-monoxide-alarm)

[3] [https://campaigns.which.co.uk/product-
safety/](https://campaigns.which.co.uk/product-safety/)

~~~
mrleiter
Oh, my bad. Thank you! :)

~~~
Hates_
But, you've made me see something I had not spotted before in that you _don't_
see what is unsafe for free on our "don't buy" pages[1]. I have raised this
right now with the team!

[1] [https://www.which.co.uk/reviews/carbon-monoxide-
detectors/ar...](https://www.which.co.uk/reviews/carbon-monoxide-
detectors/article/recommendations/which-dont-buy-carbon-monoxide-detectors)

~~~
makomk
Not only that, the Don't Buy page actively asks people to pay up in order to
find out which carbon monoxide detectors are deadly:

"Compared with Best Buy carbon monoxide detectors, the Don't Buy alarms that
we've named and shamed on this page just can’t be relied upon to detect the
gas and sound the alarm. In our tests, the Don’t Buys failed to detect carbon
monoxide in more than one-in-three of our tests. This adds up to 26 failures
out of 72 tests. By contrast, the Best Buys passed all 312 of our carbon
monoxide gas tests.

The potentially deadly CO alarms all claim to have passed the relevant EU
safety standard, EN 50291. But repeated failures in our lab tests – which
mirror those of the safety standard – lead us to doubt that they actually did.
And we’re as concerned about several lookalike models as we are about the
three models that failed our tests.

To find out which models are Don't Buys, as well as our Best Buy carbon
monoxide detectors, sign up for a £1 trial to Which?"

