CPSC Makes Recall Data Available Electronically to Businesses, 3rd Party Developers

The following is excerpted from a press release issued by the CPSC August on 31st

The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) is making its product safety information on all recalls from 1973 onward available in an electronic data set for use by businesses and software and application developers.

The General Services Administration is using this Application Program Interface (API) to feed data to the Recalls.gov mobile application, which is available for free on the Android market.

The API is formatted in XML and contains information currently found in CPSC press releases online such as brand names, product types, product descriptions, companies involved in recalls, where the products were manufactured, hazards, recall dates and UPC codes (when those are available).

Electronic access to this data will give online businesses an easier, direct and more automated way to stop the sale of recalled products. Online retailers and auction sites can use the API to automatically flag and both remove and stop the sale of recalled products quickly after a recall has been announced.
In addition, developers are encouraged to create applications and other innovative tools to put important recall information into the hands of consumers.

CPSC encourages all businesses and developers to access the API and related technical instructions on the CPSC website. The CPSC also requests user feedback on the API.