Website imprint requirements in the EU

What EU law requires, and what France adds

The floor for the whole EU is Article 5 of the e-commerce directive (2000/31/EC). Each member state wrote it into national law, and some added items. Under Article 5, a business must publish:

• Its name, or its company's legal name.
• The geographic address where it is established.
• Contact details that allow it to be reached rapidly and directly, including an email address.
• Its trade register and registration number if it is registered, and its VAT number if its activity is subject to VAT.
• For an activity that needs an authorization, the supervisory authority; for a regulated profession, the professional body, the professional title and the rules that apply.

France applies this list to online sellers (LCEN, Article 19, in French) and adds its own for every website publisher (Article 1-1): a phone number, the share capital of a registered company, the name of the publication director, who answers for what the site publishes, and the host's name, address and phone number. An individual publishing without any business activity can stay anonymous by giving their identity to the host and publishing the host's details.

What we find on the sites we audit

These percentages cover about 20 websites we audited between August 14, 2026 and September 24, 2026. Each one counts only the sites where the point could be checked. Many were audited because a defect showed up quickly, so these figures describe our audits, not websites in general.

Published, but linked from nowhere

A legal notice page can exist and still be impossible to find: the footer, the menu and every other page leave it out. Visitors looking for it cannot find it, and the person who built the site never notices, because they know the address.

Article 5 asks for access that is easy, direct and permanent. A page nothing links to does not meet that test, even when everything on it is correct.

The audit records which of the analyzed pages link to your legal notice. When your identity already appears in the footer or on the contact page, visitors can see it, and a missing link is not reported.

What the audit checks in your notice

The audit does not stop at finding the page. It reads what the page says and checks that the company it names still exists.

• Presence: the page or document where your identity is published, in French, English or Italian.
• Ten items, one by one: company name, legal form, share capital, registered office, registration number, VAT number, phone, email, publication director and host. Items that do not apply to your legal form are not expected.
• Template placeholders left in place. A line that still reads "[Company name]" is read, and it counts as a missing item.
• Access: which of the analyzed pages link to your legal notice.
• The company named: for a French company, its SIREN number is checked against the public business register. A company the register lists as closed is reported, because the site then names a publisher that no longer exists.

The report lists every missing item. An incomplete notice is reported from three missing items upward.

What is quick to fix, and what takes more

A missing item or a forgotten placeholder is fixed in the existing page. A missing link is added once, in the footer shared by every page.

A company that has closed takes more work: you first need to establish who actually runs the site today. The terms of sale and the privacy policy that name the old company follow the same change.

If the site sells online, the legal notice is only part of what it must display. The guide on EU ecommerce legal requirements covers the rest: legal guarantee, right of withdrawal, dispute resolution, the order button and reviews.

What this check doesn't tell you

By Quentin Mathis, Z29K · updated September 28, 2026