From Fast Company:
White House aims to crack down on counterfeit goods sold online
If you’re buying Gucci on Amazon, there is a good chance it’s fake—and you probably know it. But if you’re buying batteries or medicine, you may not be aware that you’re buying a counterfeit good, and it can have disastrous results. Unfortunately, it’s much more common than you might expect.
For a 2018 Government Accountability Office report, the agency’s investigators purchased brand-name products from third-party vendors on sites such as Amazon, walmart.com, Sears, newegg.com, and eBay. It found that a whopping 40% of the goods they had purchased were fake.
The Trump administration is taking action to fight the online sale of counterfeit goods. President Donald Trump signed a memorandum aiming to curb the sale of counterfeit items online. In a Wall Street Journal op-ed, trade adviser Peter Navarro wrote that the new measure “instructs the Department of Homeland Security to coordinate with federal law-enforcement agencies working to combat counterfeiting.” The Departments of Homeland Security, Commerce, and Justice will report back to the White House in 210 days with an analysis of the problem and the effectiveness of current responses, as well as their recommendations for potential regulatory or legislative changes to combat the sale of fake goods. The memo does not offer specific details about how the White House will address the issue, and customs and border patrol agents have spent years fighting the importation of counterfeit goods. Instead, according to Navarro, this memo serves as warning to e-commerce companies to try a little harder to crack down on third-party sellers offering counterfeit goods on their sites....MORE
