More than 50% of counterfeit products seized at EU borders come from e-commerce
Wearing the most iconic trainers of the moment, carrying that luxury handbag our favourite influencer shows off on social media, or getting the latest Ray-Ban sunglasses model can lead many to do whatever it takes to get that item… even if it is a counterfeit.
With a little patience and knowing how to run the right searches online, it is relatively easy to find several online stores—mainly Chinese-origin marketplaces—where you can find counterfeits of all kinds: from an FCB Barça or Real Madrid shirt to pharmaceutical products.
There are even YouTube channels dedicated to unboxing purchases made on these counterfeit marketplaces to show the “quality” of the counterfeits bought.
China, the Asian giant, dominates this illegal market with more than 75% of the products (of all kinds) that reach Europe.
Far behind are Hong Kong at 5.7%, Turkey at 5.6%, and Singapore at 3.3%.
The main counterfeit products sold online are perfumery and cosmetics items, pharmaceutical products, and sunglasses, according to the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO).
In an interview with the newspaper ABC conducted a few days ago, Selva Orejón stresses: “The internet has yet another advantage for these pirates. Counterfeiters have the entire infrastructure in place,” says Selva Orejón. “On AliExpress, Instagram, Wallapop, Vinted, Telegram… on any platform with many connected users, fake brand profiles proliferate,” she adds.
SOME FIGURES FROM THE COUNTERFEIT MARKET
- High-end counterfeits result in the loss of more than €14.5 billion in tax revenue for European governments.
- They cause the loss of 760,000 jobs.
- Counterfeits account for 6.8% of all EU imports, worth €121 billion a year.
- It is the second most lucrative criminal offence in the world ($650 billion), after drug trafficking ($750 billion).
The most common frauds
The technological tricks are highly varied. “China is the main country producing counterfeits and Turkey the major distributor. A counterfeiter in China can have an Amazon channel for six months and take it down at any time. They do not care about the reputation of their own channel. They buy ratings, reviews, followers… to appear more credible. They use the brand’s own images to fill their profiles and websites, which do not last long because we detect them, request removal, but they open another profile again in the blink of an eye,” says Selva Orejón.
But it is not only brands that are harmed—consumers lose out too. It is common for the buyer to end up a victim of online fraud and receive an imitation that has nothing to do with the photo, or worse: to pay and receive nothing at all.
How can major brands fight to tackle this scourge?
Major brands are partnering with technology companies, like ours, to address this flood of imitations. To do so, they are already using blockchain, or the Internet of Things in their fight against illegal copies.
Artificial intelligence is also being used, such as ‘crawlers’ and search spiders, to detect logos, brand names, images, and keywords that classify and identify content that infringes the brand and can be removed using legal tools.
Some marketplaces, for their part, are making efforts to put an end to the sale of counterfeit products on their websites. “We know they are investing and want to create a safe, lawful, and transparent environment within their online commerce,” says Andema’s Director General, Gerard Guiu.
However, until there is a strong regulatory framework in the EU, the timeframes of slow administrative bureaucracy are reduced, and more resources are allocated to combat fraud, it is clear that the problem is still far from being solved.