Internet is growing fast offering more and more information. Not only more sites are opened daily, also more individual consumers are having access to Internet. The individual consumer is confronted with a huge amount of information in different fields. Although there are a lot of search possibilities, there is no easy way to assess the quality of the information. Finding, selecting and assessing the right information will be a very important item in the near future on Internet. Consumer organisations, as neutral information providers, could play a role in this process. Not only as content providers, but also by actively screening and evaluating other neutral (consumer) information.

In the frame work of the work programme of the Information Society ( DG XIII, DG for telecommunication, Information Market and exploitation of Research), ISPO, the Dutch consumer organisation (Consumentenbond) and the Austrian consumer organisation (VKI) have set up a project " Quality assessment of consumer information on Internet". The duration of the project is 14 months starting in January 1997. The final report should be ready April 1998

The aim of the project is to offer the consumer a possibility to find reliable neutral (consumer) information on Internet by:

• Setting up a co-ordination body for consumer organisations and other neutral information providers who have a site on the Internet.
• Setting up a quality assessment program for consumer information on Internet and a linked database.
• Building a site on Internet that uses the information as outcome of the quality assessment program.
• Defining and constructing of an intelligent search engine for the database in different languages.
• Disseminating the information on basis of individual interest profiles either via www or e-mail.

The outcome of the project should be a demonstration of a world-wide Consumer information Internetsite, where consumers can find unbiased information about products and services and can exchange their experiences with products. In first instance the project will concentrate on the following subject fields: audio/video, cars, photographic equipment, household appliances and sports goods.

Co-ordination body:

The first task is having a survey ( questionnaire and web search) among consumer organisations and other neutral content providers. The systems used and content they provide will be evaluated and terms of reference for a model Internet site will be developed. A co-ordination body will be finally set up.

Quality assessment program

Aim of this part of the project is screening (neutral) information on Internet and evaluating the quality. In first instance priority fields will be defined, experts ( project officers of consumer organisations) will set up terms of reference, gather and analyse the information offered on Internet. In this way there will be a "database" with approved consumer/neutral information.

Site on Internet

A demonstration Internet site will be build to disseminate the information gathered. This site will be set up in such a way that every consumer organisation or neutral content provider can use it as base for his own site.

This site should at least consist of the following parts:

• information about the consumer organisations in general
• links to the own sites of the different organisations
• links to sites recommended by the consumer organisations
• suggestion area: users can give advise on sites to test by the consumer organisations

The site makes use of a special search engine and profile software.

Search engine

In order to make the information more accessible to consumers a search engine will be developed in different languages. This search engine is especially made for consumer information.

Profile software

In order to tailor the information to the needs of the individual consumer profile software will be developed especially for the field of consumer information. People can state their special interest in certain fields and only that information is retrieved.

Progress up to date

• Coordination body has been formed.
• Survey has been held
• Demonstration Internetsite has been build www.consumerweb.org
• Quality standards have been defined
• Database structure, search engine and profiling system are in the final stage