The Dutch NVWA (Netherlands Food and Consumer Product Safety Authority) has tested 41 USB chargers and found that 10 of them (of which 7 were generic no brands) showed “serious technical problems with risk of electrical shock and fire”.
An additional 14 (most of them from well known brands) either posed a small risk and/or lacked required documentation which prevented a full evaluation of their safety.
Only 17 in total fulfilled all requirements.
Unfortunately the results are available in Dutch only but most of it will be self-explanatory and Google Translate produces a decent English translation:
Even though some of these were sold by non-EU sellers I checked some of the pictures (which unfortunately are very small) and at least some (probably all) of the dangerous ones bear the CE mark. Unfortunately given the location of the sellers the authorities are powerless to do something about this so I guess it’s just caveat emptor.
I have so many USB chargers left over from old cell phones and tablets, I have no need to buy my own. Never have any issues with them, but then they all bear the big name’s logos like Apple, Motorola and HTC, so maybe they’re better built to start with.
That they group “small risk” with “lacking documentation” is a bit misleading. A charger without CE documentation can be just as safe as one without, but cannot prove it.
Clicked through to your website. Love the overview with the
Yeah, the grouping is unfortunate, but at least for each device they do note if it was just a lack of documentation or if an actual safety issue was found as well. Of this yellow group only 2 were seen to have an actual problem, the others simply lacked documentation. I suppose that means the manufacturer was unable to produce proof of (CE) certification, which as you say in itself doesn’t mean it’s unsafe and it doesn’t even mean that it wasn’t tested for safety according to those standards; they ‘just’ don’t have the paperwork to prove it (which is bad enough for hopefully self-respecting brands such as Sony, Nokia and Samsung).
In any case that is why I only mentioned the 10 devices with serious risk issues in this thread’s title and not the total of 24 that have been banned (which is of course what the Dutch online newspaper that I got this from initially ran with).
and some are downright scary!
i had one samsung knockoff that exploded on its first plug in.blew the top cap off.
another broke down at 300v line to usb +5.
