Regulation of insurance comparative advertisements: focusing on the legislative cases and disputes in Germany

Abstract

Comparative advertisements for insurance products can be used to receive selection from potential buyers by delivering accurate information to consumers by clarifying their differentiation through objective comparison of products or services between advertisers and competitors. Currently, regulations on comparative advertising of insurance products are governed by the Labeling and Advertising Act in Korea, the Enforcement Decree of the same Act, and the Comparative Advertising Review Guidelines. Through the general law applied to general products and services, regulations in the form of prohibiting unreasonable display and advertising are being enforced even for insurance products. Of course, this regulatory system does not create a large legal vacuum. However, related issues such as the possibility of comparative advertising between offline and online sales channels due to the characteristics of insurance products as legal products and changes in sales channels due to the emergence of online sales channels are derived. Considering these points, this paper reviewed German legislative examples and dispute cases in order to derive implications related to the legal regulations of insurance product comparison advertisements. In particular, this study reviewed the comparative advertising acceptance criteria and related cases under the Unfair Competition Prevention Act, which is a general law on comparative advertising in Germany, and reviewed the requirements and precedents regarding the applicability of comparative advertising between competing companies in relation to insurance products. Based on this, this paper discussed the matters to be considered for the establishment of a regulatory system for insurance product comparison advertising in Korea and the need to establish self-regulatory insurance product comparison advertising guidelines.