POLAND Law and Practice Contributed by: Szymon Gogulski, Marek Oleksyn and Damian Ludwiniak, Sołtysiński Kawecki & Szlęzak
food or drink containing ingredients that are in exces - sive amounts in the daily diet. 3.3 Dark Patterns The use of dark patterns may lead to the violation of several Polish and EU legal regulations, including the GDPR and regulations related to consumer protection, unfair competition, or unfair market practices. In 2022, the European Data Protection Board published guide - lines regarding the usage of dark patterns (www.edpb. europa.eu), which may be helpful for online advertis - ing. With the coming into force of the EU Digital Ser - vices Act, a prohibition on the use of dark patterns has recently been introduced for online platform providers. Guidance is also provided within the individual deci - sions of the OCCP, in which the authority imposes penalties on entrepreneurs for using dark patterns. In its decision issued in May 2025, the OCCP clas - sified the practice of permanent and endless promo - tions as a dark pattern. These promotions, such as constantly renewed discount codes and countdown clocks for limited-time offers, create artificial pressure on consumers. By emphasising the uniqueness of a discount – such as those associated with a brand’s birthday, pre-holiday weekends, or shopping nights – this practice pressures consumers into making pur - chasing decisions they might not have made if they were fully informed about the seller’s practices. 3.4 Sponsor Identification and Branded Content Marketing content that is sponsored or branded must be clearly identified as such to comply with the gen - eral principle of not misleading the consumer. Recent - ly, this has been particularly important in the context of online influencers tagging sponsored posts. For example: • online marketing materials (including auto promo - tion) shall be tagged as #advertising, #co-advertis - ing, #sponsoredmaterial or #paidcollaboration; • abbreviations or ambiguous terms such as #promo should be avoided; and • events, series, films or programmes broadcast in media that are sponsored or branded must con - tain precise information on such sponsorship or product placement (eg, “the programme contains
product placement” or “the programme is spon - sored by”). 3.5 Special Rules for Native Advertising Hidden advertising is prohibited under both the UCL and the UMPL. The UMPL expressly provides that advertising that involves the use of journalistic con - tent in the mass media to promote a product when the business has paid for this promotion, and this is not clearly evident from the content or from images or sounds that are easily recognisable by the consumer, is considered an unfair market practice in all circum - stances. Advertisements must be clearly marked as not constituting editorial material. To achieve this, wording such as “sponsored”, “sponsored article”, “advertisement”, “product placement” (for broad - casts) or “content developed in collaboration with the brand” is used. Advertisers also distinguish the advertising material from other content (eg, by using different graphic effects). Poland has transposed Directive 2006/114/EC within the scope concerning comparative advertising. Under the UCL, comparative advertising in Poland is permit - ted as long as it aligns with good commercial prac - tices ( dobre obyczaje ). Comparative advertising com - plies with good commercial practices if the following prerequisites are jointly met: • it is not misleading; • it compares goods or services meeting the same needs or intended for the same purpose; • it objectively compares one or more material, rele - vant, verifiable and representative features of those goods and services, which may include price; • it does not discredit or denigrate the trade marks, trade names, other distinguishing marks, goods, services, activities or circumstances of a competi - tor; • for products with a designation of origin, it relates in each case to products with the same designa - tion; 4. Comparative Advertising and Ambush Marketing 4.1 Specific Rules or Restrictions
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