A report published by the Norwegian Consumer Council is making uncomfortable reading for some of the world’s biggest tech companies. The document argues that many firms are deliberately degrading their hardware and software after purchase, nudging users toward new payments, subscriptions, or add-on services they never originally signed up for.
“Enshittification” — Yes, That’s the Official Term
The report, titled
Breaking Free: Pathways to a Fair Technological Future, spans dozens of pages and uses a term that is as blunt as it is accurate:
enshittification. The word describes a recurring pattern in which a product or service is deliberately allowed to decay over time. First, companies attract users with something genuinely useful and competitively priced. Then, they introduce changes that serve commercial partners over customers. Finally, the system is squeezed to its limits for the benefit of shareholders — at the direct expense of the user experience.
The report identifies four sectors as particularly hard hit:
connected devices, printers, video games, and cars.
The Norwegian Consumer Council isn’t just naming and shaming — it’s calling for concrete legislative action. Together with 28 other consumer organizations, it has sent an open letter to the European Union demanding stronger enforcement of rules that already exist, including the
Digital Markets Act and the
GDPR.
One piece of legislation already in the pipeline is the EU’s new
right-to-repair directive, which comes into force on July 31. It will require manufacturers to allow third-party repairs, breaking the grip companies currently hold over their own service networks.
But the most significant target is the upcoming
Digital Fairness Act, expected in the European Commission’s 2026 work programme. The proposed legislation aims to tackle some of the digital economy’s most persistent problems:
- Deceptive interfaces and dark patterns
- Influencer marketing abuses
- Addictive design patterns
- Unfair personalization practices
Gamers join the Fight
The public consultation launched around these issues received around
3,000 responses in just the first two weeks — a sign of how widely felt these frustrations are. Among the most vocal participants were video game players rallying behind the
“Stop Killing Games” campaign, which calls for legislation to prevent publishers from remotely disabling games that users have already paid for.
The breadth of the response suggests this is no niche concern. From smart home devices to car software updates to games you bought and can no longer play, the feeling that technology is being engineered to get worse — not better — over time is one that millions of consumers across
Europe recognize all too well.
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