Articles
Fakes of your products are sold on Amazon, eBay, Walmart, Temu and TikTok Shop, and they can hurt the people who trust your name. Takedowns are whack-a-mole, and the money behind these fakes funds organized crime. These papers show how it works and how brands make the counterfeiters pay. The brands named in our articles are the targets of the counterfeiters, not the source.
The Brand Briefing
8 papersEight papers. A brand that understands them knows more about marketplace counterfeiting than nearly every other brand, and most of the professionals it could hire.
Yes. Fake infant formula, a baby’s car seat, diet pills and airbags, sold under real brand names, and what regulators and the courts found.
Consumer safety Read → PAPER · 02 Do Marketplace Counterfeits Really Threaten National Security?Yes, and the government said so first. What it found, why marketplaces make it harder, and when a counterfeit case becomes a national security matter.
National security Read → PAPER · 03 Is Marketplace Counterfeiting Really That Widespread?Yes. The border, a federal test buy, a global estimate and the courts all show counterfeiting at scale. Here is what each one proves, and where it stops.
Scale Read → PAPER · 04 Can a Brand Know It’s Being Counterfeited Without Buying Product?Yes. Your customers are already telling you, and the places counterfeiters sell are open to anyone.
Detection Read → PAPER · 05 Why Will Attorneys and Intelligence Vendors Work on Contingency?Because in a counterfeit case against marketplace sellers, a court can freeze the sellers’ money before the case is decided, and recovery comes from that money.
Recovery Read → PAPER · 06 Which Counterfeiters Should a Brand Go After First?The largest ones still selling. The law lets a brand recover a counterfeiter’s profits, and the profits sit with the sellers who sell the most.
Targeting Read → PAPER · 07 Why Don’t Takedowns Stop Counterfeiters?Because a takedown removes a listing or an account, not the person behind it. What hurts a counterfeiter is losing money.
Takedowns Read → PAPER · 08 Why Is Our Ecommerce System So Broken?Because manufacturers no longer choose who sells their products. Third-party sellers do, and the law that checks them does not ask where their goods come from.
Marketplaces Read →Counterfeit case studies
2 articlesHow $100 Million in Fake Cisco Gear Moved Through Fifteen Marketplace Storefronts
Counterfeit Read → COUNTERFEIT · 02 How Brands Can Squeeze Counterfeiters From the Storefront SideTurning the Counterfeiter's Own Marketplace Behavior Against It
Counterfeit Read →New papers and category reports are emailed to brands on our Watch List.