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People use the term “blast from the past” a little too lightly for our tastes. For many folks, stumbling across an old pair of bellbottoms or a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles rerun – not that new show, the awesome one from the late 80s – constitutes as a blast from the past. Logitech just learned a whole meaning of the phrase; the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency just slammed the company with a $261,000 fine for “making unsubstantiated health claims” about its now-discontinued MX3200 keyboard/mouse combo.
According to the EPA, Logitech incorporated a silver compound into the MX3200 to help prevent disintegration. However, the company then made claims that the keyboard killed microbes and bacteria (presumably because the AgION compound used is a registered pesticide). Unfortunately for Logitech, you can’t just go around making claims like that without proof. While the company immediately stopped making bacteria-busting claims when the EPA contacted them about the issue, it still wasn’t enough to dodge a fine.
“Unverified public health claims can lead people to believe they are protected from disease-causing organisms when, in fact, they are not,” said Jared Blumenfeld, the EPA’s Regional Administrator for the Pacific Southwest, in the EPA’s press release. “The EPA takes very seriously its responsibility to enforce the law against companies that make such claims for their products.”
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Ghok
September 29, 2011 at 11:39am
There are so many products out there attached to bogus claims, and all too often the companies that make them get away with it. When a person does this, we call them a con artist or swindler, yet we've somehow come to accept that large companies will exaggerate their claims to the point of lying, and that's just business as usual. When it's related to health, that really crosses a line. Logitech made a mistake, and were given a fair fine to discourage them from doing it again. This is how it should work.
rwpritchett
September 29, 2011 at 11:52am
Just to clarify, Logitech got in trouble for not properly registering an antimicrobial label claim with the EPA. That does not mean that their product is not antimicrobial... only they don't have the means to substantiate that claim.
I've personally worked with silver in a microbiology lab and have studied it's antimicrobial effects. Coincidentally, my studies were for EPA registration. That being said, I was suprised at how well silver actually does kill bacteria.
X
September 30, 2011 at 8:24am
Please reread actual artical. Just to clairify, I quote:
" The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has ordered computer peripherals maker Logitech, Inc. to pay $261,000 to settle a case against the company for making unsubstantiated public health claims about its keyboard, a violation of federal law. The company incorporated a silver compound designed to protect a keyboard against deterioration, then marketed the keyboard as protecting the user from bacteria and microbes."
Their was no talk of exact compound used so therefor no way of knowing its actual properties. If there were no studies to back this up then they have no right claiming it is antimicrobial. Even if silver does, in fact, have microb-killing properties.
DDRDiesel
September 29, 2011 at 11:32am
Correct me if I am wrong, but wasn't there a keyboard a few years back that actually DID have a kind of anti-bacterial use? If I remember correctly, the keys were manufactured with microscopic carbon nanotubes to skewer the bacteria and kill them on contact
aarcane
September 29, 2011 at 11:04am
That is a very fair fine. a slap on the wrist for what's apparently an obvious and easy mistake.
Conal_keaney
September 29, 2011 at 10:50am
In my mind, logitech was probably had a "OH SH!T" moment as soon as the EPA started asking questions about their claims. Nonetheless, as much as I like products from logitech, I think it is fair of the EPA to slam a fine.
