Safeguarding Against Intellectual Property Theft due to Counterfeit Goods Sold Online

The global market today is not blind to the scourge that is counterfeiting. Studies done recently show that the global fake merchandise market is expected to grow in the year 2020 and reach a value of 1.8 Trillion US dollars. The technological advancements in the field of software, product design and so forth have made it much more easier for counterfeiters to duplicate the features of original products, and thus make it hard for people to spot the differences between the original product and the counterfeited product. This causes revenue loss to the original manufacturer who has invested precious time and money into the research and development of the product.

Counterfeited products are not good for the overall business ecosystem, and has shattered the quality and high standards held by reputed brands both on the online platform as well as at brick and mortar stores. They are not good for the interest of the customers, and can cause problems later on, due to their counterfeit nature. Many customers spend a lot of money on counterfeited products thinking that they are from the original manufacturer.

A study put this figure at 460 Billion US dollars every year – which is a significant amount of money. Before the online e-commerce revolution, the market for counterfeit goods was mostly at the brick and mortar store level, and was not as pre-dominant. With the advent of online e-commerce stores, it has become very easy for counterfeited goods to be sold and proliferated online, and even large e-commerce chains are not immune to this.

So the question therefore arises, how do I protect my product and intellectual property from becoming a victim to counterfeiting on the online e-commerce ecosystem?

Hire a Professional Agency

The easiest way to do this would be to hire a professional agency like Wiser Market to do it for you. With their experience in global online brand protection services, intellectual property protection, anti-counterfeit and trademark infringement services, they are better poised to help you figure out the best resolution in the event of an IP theft happening, or they can help you prevent it from happening in the first place.

It can be pretty hard to identify a counterfeit product, especially if it looks very similar to your product. But there are some ways in which you can identify a fake rip-off of your product. When you are looking at products online, first find out who the seller is and verify their authenticity. You will be able to find the authorized dealers list for a particular product, or you might already know it if you are the manufacturer, and that way you can cross check the authenticity of the product.

Check the spelling and grammar on the product. Often, counterfeited products have certain spelling mistakes on them, and it is a dead giveaway. Check the serial numbers and codes that are printed on the product packaging with the numbers that you have, to find any mismatch.