
Counterfeit books “shipped and sold by Amazon”? - fortran77
https://twitter.com/nostarch/status/1183095004258099202
======
mariomariomario
This happens because Amazon allows inventory commingling. For example Amazon
has their own, legitimate inventory in a West Coast warehouse, and a third
party seller has the same inventory with the original UPC manufacturer bar
code on it, sitting in an East Coast warehouse. Amazon considers this 1:1
inventory. Amazon will debit their inventory on the West Coast, and credit the
inventory that belongs to the third party seller on the East Coast but they
will send the inventory from the East Coast to the customer since it's closer
to them.

Now in theory this seems like a reasonable approach to deliver products to
customers faster, the catch 22 is that third party vendors have clearly taken
advantage of Amazon's complete lack of quality control. Third party sellers
can sign up for a Seller Central account, and send in counterfeit products
with fake bar codes because Amazon doesn't check at all.

I could sit here and talk for hours about mess that is Seller Central. I've
dabbled with Fulfilled by Amazon (FBA), and I would never recommend any
company use AMZN for third party logistics.

~~~
billpollock
Unfortunately this case may be a bit different. When you order this book by
pressing just the Buy button, as in shipped and sold by Amazon, you get the
counterfeit.

I know because I ordered two copies last week. Both came and both were
counterfeit.

~~~
perspective1
I think you're thinking Amazon separates its own SKUs from third party SKUs.
That's not the case, it's _all_ comingled.

~~~
beerandt
The only way to be somewhat sure, is to find a 3rd party seller who _doesn 't_
use Fulfilled by Amazon.

Amazon has managed to completely invert the original hierarchy of seller
trust.

------
rietta
I have been a frequent Amazon customer since 2000 and no longer order anything
expensive or safety related (including things like USB chargers or any baby
related furniture) from Amazon. I just no longer trust them at all to not be
shipping counterfeit or unsafe goods. I've even started going to Best Buy to
purchase certain peripherals that I needed on short notice because of this.
Besides, at the rate my wife has bought stuff and then sent it back - paying
the return shipping fee - we would come out ahead shopping local anyway for
her cloths and things.

~~~
hellcow
Yup, agreed 100%.

I recently purchased 2 Lenovo 65w USB-C chargers. One came shrink-wrapped in a
legitimate Lenovo box. The other was in a plain cardboard box with a prominent
"Made in China" as its only branding. These were sold from the very same
product page.

When I told Amazon, I had to go to UPS to return the fake product to them to
receive my refund, so not only do I have to purchase it again (obviously not
from Amazon), I have to go to a store to send it back to them -- defeating the
whole purpose of ordering it online to begin with.

I've received fake books and other things before as well. Each time I reported
it to Amazon, and each time nothing happens.

This is completely unacceptable, and I just now cancelled my Prime membership,
which I had since pretty much day one.

~~~
beerandt
For whatever reason, the counterfeiters have no problem lying about anything,
except the "Made in China" label.

I'm sure there's a good reason for this, but it's been the only consistent
red-flag I've encountered.

~~~
ceejayoz
I'd imagine customs can identify "that came on a boat from China but says
'made in USA'" more easily than "the internal electronics in that charger
aren't up to snuff".

~~~
beerandt
I'm sure. It's just become so normal to doubt every aspect of a product, that
it's _strange_ to have some element of consistency.

Of course the label of origin still isn't likely to match what was on the
product page. But that's almost a plus in helping to ID fakes.

~~~
Jb6
Because when you import stuff to the U.S. it has to have the country of origin
clearly marked somewhere. That's why it says Made in China.

------
wsh
Daimler AG’s lawsuit, filed in 2017, over allegedly counterfeit Mercedes-Benz
wheel caps that were, similarly, sold by Amazon.com and not a third party, is
apparently still pending:

[https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/6173730/daimler-ag-v-
am...](https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/6173730/daimler-ag-v-amazoncom-
inc/)

The complaint:

[https://www.pacermonitor.com/view/EY4BP4Y/Daimler_AG_v_Amazo...](https://www.pacermonitor.com/view/EY4BP4Y/Daimler_AG_v_Amazoncom_Inc__cacdce-17-07674__0001.0.pdf)

~~~
ikeboy
They just settled two weeks ago. See the last document filed.

~~~
donarb
There's no information on a settlement, only that both parties agree to drop
the lawsuit.

~~~
ikeboy
A case being mutually dismissed with prejudice means a settlement happened. If
it's dismissed without prejudice it could be either way.

------
mjfern
As an aside, why does nearly every Twitter link take you to a page not found
thus requiring a reload? This is a terrible user experience that should be
easy to fix.

~~~
2ion
Oh, when I open Twitter in Firefox on Android tweets fail to load in 95% of
the cases, however the Twitter site itself loads fine enough to show me a
Retry button I can press to fail at loading the tweet again. All the while
accessing via 'app' and even embedded tweets on 3rd-party sites load fine.
Can't recall when this started; must have been some time in 2018.

On the desktop (in Firefox also, same addons and addon config too) things
always work (as far as that can be said for a site as horribly slow as
theirs).

They have been completely below the bar in terms of UX for a long time now, at
least for me. They used to have a lean, good/available and fast site, and now
they don't.

~~~
shantly
I'd assumed it was on purpose to push you toward the app. I don't see it as
much on desktop.

------
ohgreatwtf
[https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07B452QQS/](https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07B452QQS/)

Check this product out. It's made in a chinese guy's garage in northern
california using equipment he imported in 2014.

It doesn't have legitimate GMP or FDA licensing.

This is the kind of problem we are talking about.

And the issue is worse than it appears, just as toast0 mentioned, because the
same exact product with same product page and AMAZON barcode, NO UPC, is also
in the online walmart marketplace now! Amazon so controls the market that the
other companies just do whatever amazon does. This is a literal antitrust
situation we are in- sherman act violations.

There are international food products on amazon marked "made for/picked
exclusively for amazon". That's a violation of the FTC act. We are in a
situation where our government is failing to regulate.

~~~
wenc
I wonder if we could catch counterfeits by checking a code against some sort
of ledger on the manufacturer's end, and do this at scale.

~~~
xkcd-sucks
Some brands, like FiiO (high end audio gear made by a Chinese company), have a
web portal for checking authenticity of UUID "serial" codes

~~~
sithadmin
Many pharmaceutical manufacturers offer the same sort of online verification
portal, especially for products sold outside the USA.

------
bensonn
Amazon is a TRILLION dollar company with 230 billion in Revenue and over 10
billion in Profits. Bezos himself is worth over 100 billion dollars. Amazon is
a technology leader.

I normally am not a "wealth-hater" or whatever you want to call it, but Amazon
(and Bezos personally) are on a whole different level. This is NOT a cash-
strapped mom-and-pop struggling to understand a complex marketplace. This is a
company so large it created and controls the marketplace. Depending on the
day, this could be the most valuable company in the world and Bezos is the
richest person on the planet. There are few, if any, companies with more
skills, knowledge and resources.

The magnitude of the existing wealth in comparison to the relative pittance it
would cost to put a stop to this it what makes it so shameful.

~~~
markus_zhang
Yeah. TBH I just want them to do business properly, you know, just give us
regular quality books. I don't think I'm asking for a lot.

My local Chapters (A Canadian bookstore) closed door a few years ago, and some
second-hand shops also closed their doors since then.

------
remotecool
I have been selling books for the last decade and started seeing an influx of
counterfeit books on Amazon about two years ago.

I've even gotten cease and desist letters from lawyers representing the top
publishers because I resold a few by mistake.

The worst part is that there is no clear way to tell if a book is counterfeit,
the publishers wont actually tell you specifics, and the only way to know for
sure is to send the book to the publisher.

When you send it to the publisher, you will get an answer in about 6 months
(yes/no) and the answer is always yes.

You have no way to get your original money back for the counterfeit and
nothing is learned about how to more easily detect counterfeits.

I feel like this is intentionally vague so they can go after anyone for
counterfeits and there is really no way to know if you have a counterfeit or
not without a lengthy court case.

I finally had to get an attorney involved and I just had to pass along Amazon
seller information. They went away and I haven't had any issues since then
(about 2 years ago).

------
awat
If I had to take a guess this is related to books that have illegal PDF(s) in
the wild. Paired with Amazon making little to no effort to verify product
authenticity.

[https://arstechnica.com/information-
technology/2019/02/amazo...](https://arstechnica.com/information-
technology/2019/02/amazon-caught-selling-counterfeits-of-publishers-computer-
books-again/)

~~~
TeMPOraL
Or legal PDFs. No Starch Press books are regularly featured in Humble Bundles
in PDF form, including the book from the Tweet.

------
rietta
Just this year, one of my team members ordered a Blue Yeti microphone off
Amazon. We were in a WebRTC meeting when it arrived and I watched him
excitedly open it and his facial expression turn sour because it was a glass
jar in a Blue Yeti box!!! The sadder part is he left it in the kitchen at his
home with the intention of dealing with it later and his dad, not knowing what
it was threw it out with the garbage. There was nothing my team member could
do or return to Amazon to prove of the fraud. He ended up buying again from
another retailer, completely out of the money spent on the first order.

~~~
iends
Couldn’t he just have replaced it with another glass jar?

~~~
rietta
That would open Pandora's box of ethical concerns.

------
danso
I just ordered a carbon monoxide detector from Amazon, supposedly shipped from
the manufacturer. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t immediately think of
Amazon’s many counterfeit scandals before ultimately ordering it as I do most
things, out of habit. Still, this is a thing for which silent failure is
catastrophic, so maybe I’ll send it back tomorrow.

~~~
Rebelgecko
I was recently looking for some dusk masks to have handy due to fires in my
area. It's such a clusterfuck when you look on Amazon. They have special
labels like "Amazon's choice" or "Editor Recommended" which have nothing to do
with the efficacy of the mask. A lot of masks make claims about being NIOSH
approved and N95 certified, but they don't provide the approval numbers and
NIOSH has no records of the manufacturer. I even saw some masks that supplied
an invalid NIOSH approval number (it had been revoked in 2014).

Some of the cheaper listings from legitimate companies sound like they're
either counterfeit or some weird bulk reseller. A lot of reviews complaining
about how the masks just came loose in the Amazon box with no packaging.

I ordered some legit looking masks but figure it's a bit of a crapshoot

~~~
heavyset_go
> A lot of masks make claims about being NIOSH approved and N95 certified, but
> they don't provide the approval numbers and NIOSH has no records of the
> manufacturer. I even saw some masks that supplied an invalid NIOSH approval
> number (it had been revoked in 2014).

IMO, this is criminal.

~~~
masonic
Just like the fake eclipse glasses of a couple of years ago. At one point,
essentially _all_ were found to be fake/not-as-spec and Amazon had zero
available two weeks before the eclipse.

~~~
heavyset_go
I just don't understand why Amazon isn't held liable for the products they
sell. If Walmart sold fake products that put people at risk or worse, lawyers
would have a field day.

------
sasaf5
I stopped buying books from amazon since 2016. Bought an 80$ technical book
that came as if it was printed from a pdf. Equations are barely readable. I
made a review with pictures and no action has been taken. I have been buying
from the local retailer since then.

------
joshu
This has been happening to No Starch for quite some time, with no action by
Amazon. Shameful.

------
theaccordance
My business partners and I had a satire book published through Amazon's
platform for a couple years. This past spring the book gained some viral
traction thanks to Unilad (or similar site - I forget which), but that
attention led to copycats submitting a takedown notice on the book before
republishing our book as their own.

The appeal process was a complete joke; we had to get a lawyer involved to get
Amazon to release the royalties it withheld because of the take-down.

------
irrational
Shipped and sold by Amazon is meaningless. Just search for "Amazon 3rd party
commingling" Basically everything with the same UPC or SKU code is put into
the same bin in the warehouses, regardless of where it came from. So legit and
counterfeit inventory is stored in the same bin. When you order something it
is the luck of the draw (literally) what you will get.

This is a problem for anything Amazon sells, not just books. I play board
games and counterfeit board games are very very common. So much so that I
wouldn't recommend anyone buy a boardgame from Amazon. Buy them from Cool
Stuff Inc, Miniature Market, Cardhaus, etc. instead.

Incidentally, just this past week we allowed our Prime membership to lapse and
don't plan on renewing it. With problems like this one, its just not worth it
anymore.

~~~
markus_zhang
Nowadays I'm inclined more and more to purchase from local stores. At least I
can investigate the merchandises before making the purchases. Plus I found out
that they also have nice discounts from time to time.

Re-packaging and mailing back the poor quality purchases is the major pain
point here, and I'm pretty sure Amazon is losing some business because of
that. Maybe the revenue from books sales is not much comparing to the others,
but potential buyers buy other merchandises too.

------
gesman
Amazon's inaction is just welcoming and awaiting for a government-led
crackdown

~~~
KibbutzDalia
Maybe if someone gets a counterfeit copy of “Art of the Deal” the government
will shut Amazon down.

------
onfe
Amazon leans heavily on convenience to sell lots of stuff. If I have to read a
handful of reviews and cross my fingers whenever getting a legitimate product
is important, is it really so convenient? So far the market says yes, but I
sure would move elsewhere if there _was_ an elsewhere.

~~~
my_first_acct
There is an elsewhere.

The OP suggests bn.com (Barnes and Noble) for books. I haven't tried them
myself. Yet.

For household goods I like walmart.com (the sold-by-Walmart items, not the
ones from 3rd-party sellers). Free 2-day shipping (in the US) for orders over
$35. A supply chain that (I hope and assume) does not allow 3rd party sellers
to introduce counterfeits, unlike the so-called "sold by Amazon" items that
are promiscuously commingled with items supplied by 3rd-party sellers.

So for anything where a counterfeit product could pose a health risk, I check
walmart.com first.

(I feel a bit strange touting Walmart as the underdog, since it certainly
comes with its own set of baggage, but it does seem to be one of the few
companies big enough to keep Amazon from gaining a complete monopoly).

~~~
techsupporter
I've gone (back) to Target and Barnes and Noble for items that smaller shops
don't sell. It has a lot to do with both of them being less than half a mile
from where I live so I can walk there with ease, but both also still have very
wide product availability and offer pickup from store for free or inexpensive
rates.

------
sitkack
I have a counterfeit Horowitz and Hill from Amazon. I called twice and go no
where with them.

[https://artofelectronics.net/the-book/counterfeit-
editions/](https://artofelectronics.net/the-book/counterfeit-editions/)

------
hnick
Isn't it illegal to sell counterfeit goods knowingly? I'm sure someone would
be knocking on my door if I did it.

------
alok-g
Amazon's position and efforts against counterfeits:

[https://www.aboutamazon.com/our-company/our-
positions](https://www.aboutamazon.com/our-company/our-positions)

~~~
lone_haxx0r
Wow. Are they fucking serious?

They blame federal law for not prosecuting counterfeiters instead of
themselves for allowing them to run rampant on their website? (i.e. They want
the federal government to do their house-cleaning for them.)

I never thought I'd read such a dumb excuse from a company this big.

~~~
alok-g
You seem to have missed the part about the investments they have made for the
same, perhaps doing themselves what you suggest.

~~~
lone_haxx0r
The investments they've done for something that is their resposibility in the
first place.

If I go to a restaurant and the food is rancid, I wouldn't be appeased when
the owner tells me "we've made investments to stop the food from going bad, we
even bought a refrigerator!".

~~~
alok-g
The analogy is not valid.

The marketplace at Amazon makes it a (large scale) mall, or a food court for
your analogy, not the shop that is selling. If the food from a restaurant at a
mall comes out bad, would you blame the restaurant, or the mall?

~~~
dragonwriter
The fact that Amazon displays the product—including choosing which description
from different sources to use when there are multiple sources of the same
product—charges my credit card, handles returns, etc., makes it more like a
shop than a mall or food court. It's a consignment shop that has to pay the
person who made the product available for sale once it sells, when that person
is not Amazon itself, but it's still a shop. It's not like a mall or food
court that provides a venue through which I gain access to directly interact
with individual vendors.

~~~
alok-g
So what in your opinion should the company do (or not do)?

------
didibus
> For inventory tracked with the manufacturer barcode, each seller’s sourced
> inventory of the same ASIN is stored separately in our fulfillment centers.
> We can also track the original seller of each unit.

> To fulfill your orders exclusively with your inventory, you can switch to
> the Amazon barcode at any time (see Changing your barcode setting below).

Source:
[https://sellercentral.amazon.com/gp/help/external/200141480?...](https://sellercentral.amazon.com/gp/help/external/200141480?language=en-
US&ref=mpbc_200243180_cont_200141480)

It seems vendors can choose to have their items commingled or not. Commingling
allows them to possibly offer faster deliveries, and they don't need to add
extra barcodes to their products.

Even if comingling is enabled, it seems it's not exactly what HN had made me
believe. Amazon still tracks and separately manage each seller's inventory,
but might choose to ship you another's seller item if it is closer to you for
faster delivery. Again, sellers can opt out of this if they don't want it.

It seems some products aren't allowed to be commingled:

> To qualify, products must: Be in new condition. Have only one scannable
> barcode that is matched to one ASIN in the Amazon catalog. Have no
> expiration date. Not be consumable or topical products such as skin creams,
> shampoos, or cosmetics. Not be dangerous goods.

I think beyond offering sellers the option to opt out of comingling, I'd like
to see it offered to buyers as well. At checkout, it could let me know that I
have the choice to get it from my chosen vendor's stock which would result in
X days delivery time. Or to get it from alternate vendor Y for Z faster days
delivery.

~~~
masonic
What stops a counterfeiter from buying a legit item and then duplicating that
barcode on theirs? They could then return the original, too.

------
kalesh
Duplicate/Counterfeit books are rampant here on Amazon India.
Return/Replacement also results in a fake. Usually, publishers have special
Indian edition prints but these fakes have $ prices & a sticker that hides
this with an Rs price. This is quite easy to check but no-one is checking for
counterfeit's on Amazon.

$ Label on a book purchased on Amazon.in

[https://serving.photos.photobox.com/77575690eea121ebb5a6d939...](https://serving.photos.photobox.com/77575690eea121ebb5a6d939a5d27f66cf579647d8f920855547a1b8b12aa26b34ced070.jpg)

Print quality is so bad.

[https://serving.photos.photobox.com/6469056496de32f9d3adef45...](https://serving.photos.photobox.com/6469056496de32f9d3adef45c590b75d55275c74bad19d68c6fc43e1ae5e84cdb101b791.jpg)

------
guiambros
I had the same problem with " _The Hundred-Page Machine Learning Book_ " [1];
the default (cheaper by a few pennies) option via Amazon Prime was sold by a
3rd party selling counterfeit copies.

I purchased another copy from Amazon directly to compare, and you could
clearly see the difference in the quality of the printing, colors, cover page.
Also some pages were different, so it seems the counterfeit used an earlier
draft of the 1st edition.

I spoke with the author, and eventually they got the 3rd party seller
suspended (at least from selling new copies), but apparently it took a couple
of weeks of back-and-forth.

[1] [https://www.amazon.com/Hundred-Page-Machine-Learning-
Book/dp...](https://www.amazon.com/Hundred-Page-Machine-Learning-
Book/dp/199957950X)

~~~
willis936
This happened to me too for a $100 textbook. It took me weeks but I got my
money back and emailed the details to the publisher.

------
newnewpdro
I wanted to buy an authentic copy of the Ashley Book of Knots.

When I searched Amazon it became so obvious that most the matches were
deliberately of ambiguous provenance and authenticity that I simply abandoned
the whole idea and haven't bought a thing on Amazon since. This was over a
year ago.

~~~
sgustard
So I just did that search and the first hit is this; can you explain what I
should be looking for?

[https://www.amazon.com/Ashley-Book-Knots-
Clifford-W/dp/03850...](https://www.amazon.com/Ashley-Book-Knots-
Clifford-W/dp/0385040253/)

~~~
newnewpdro
While that isn't the one I recall looking at when I searched, which was over a
year ago, there are multiple low-scoring comments stating that this is a low-
quality reproduction of the original. Some speculate it's just being reprinted
from the "bootleg" PDF based on what they've received.

> "Unfortunately, this printing is really poor quality. The cover color is off
> (has a pink hue to every color on the cover), the binding is lumpy, and the
> pages of the book are so thin the other side shows through. The publishers
> have obviously skimped on quality materials."

> "Although the book appeared to be new and the dust cover was new, the
> binding was loose and the paper it was printed on was substandard….my
> impression was this book was reprinted as in a bootleg copy or something
> similar. I rated it 2 stars because of the ease of returning the item."

Etc.

I actually ended up just finding the PDF online, I think it was on
archive.org, and that's that.

The problem with Amazon is they just throw them all in the same coarse-grained
bucket. If I click on "13 new from $53.88" under hardcover, there's just a
list of prices with no photos of the actual book I'm buying from the various
sources. They're _NOT_ equal, only "new" and "hardcover", it's a total
diceroll what you're going to get. If you were to buy every one of the new
hardcovers sold there, they'd all be different. I'm sure they'd all be
reproductions of the Ashley Book of Knots, but of varying quality.

The copyright is expired on this book, so the market is flooded with random
repros of varying quality. And Amazon makes no effort to help the customer
assess the provenance and quality of what they're actually getting.

------
alexfromapex
There’s also the fake review problem, where you get a real product with a
counterfeit review by some guy, or thousands of guys, that is paid on a
Facebook group to give five stars.

------
sandov
Well, guess I won't be buying any more books from Amazon or Book Depository.

------
cool-RR
I don't understand, why wouldn't you sue Amazon for an exorbitant amount?
Seems to me they'd be vulnerable and want to settle.

------
withinboredom
I used to write software for a shop that sold DVDs and CDs on Amazon. They
stopped selling FBA (sold by Amazon with your inventory or the inverse)
because of counterfeit claims. It was really frustrating to get a photo of
what the customer got and know there was no way it passed out QC. Not to
mention the one or two legal issues that came up.

------
durnygbur
Just recently tried buying Addison Wesley, O'Reilly etc IT books in English
(these are not cheap) on Amazon and gave up. First getting through the maze
whether it's from a merchant or directly from Amazon, then tracing the
comments and some people complaining it's a low quality print of a PDF from
the internet. Not worth it.

------
jxramos
I hate to see the trajectory of scammers incorporating into our global
economies and blur the lines so much that online shopping becomes dubious. As
far as I can tell eBay used to be under assault by bad characters, they
probably still are to some greatly lesser extent but it seems to have at least
exited the wild west phase they were being dragged into. Amazon should not
allow their platform to be abused even with their A-Z policy because the
unsuspecting would still be cheated.

Makes this recent ad hold more appeal about "offline shopping"
[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5c_Br-
mO7Po](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5c_Br-mO7Po)

------
markus_zhang
I have also noticed a decline of book quality since a few years ago. I'm not a
frequent buyer but I noticed that two books that I purchased were either not
clearly cut or have ALL characters badly printed. Both were purchased directly
from Amazon.

I'm really reluctant to purchase any $50+ technical books from Amazon
nowadays. I mean it does have some decent discount but the probability to get
a low quality book is too high.

Ironically, third party second-hand book sellers (listed on Amazon),
especially the ones with many sales, seem to be quite decent and I have yet to
encounter one bad case.

~~~
ansible
I don't know if I'll buy any more technical books anymore, even in electronic
form.

O'Reilly doesn't sell e-books directly, which made me mad. You can get their
subscription service, or buy the paper version. I ended up buying the book I
wanted from Google.

~~~
Marsymars
> O'Reilly doesn't sell e-books directly, which made me mad. You can get their
> subscription service, or buy the paper version.

On the plus side, all my technical book purchases are work expenses, and even
though I only read the e-book versions, I can stock the shelf in my office
with books that make it look like I'm reading Impressive Technical Things.

~~~
markus_zhang
Lucky~~

Actually I'm going to ask around if I put book purchase under some of my
expenses. Might be a bit hard as I work as a BA but am interested in more
technical stuffs.

------
nmstoker
What's wrong with just complaining as normal if this happens?

I've ordered literally hundreds of books and with the two that had issues,
they immediately dispatched another and in one case told me I needn't return
the original.

It's not hard to put in this type of complaint (unlike some where they do put
barriers in the way) and it avoids any exaggerated need to "police" Amazon,
you can just get on with life with a minor blip in the overall delivery time
of the proper (non-fake) product.

------
eecc
I don't care what particular business strategy or operational process makes
this happens. _This is Piracy_. This is what Copyright was originally
conceived to fight against.

Amazon should be slapped with the same RIAA/MPAA-style grotesquely theatrical
/ existential threat fines that random individuals were treated with.
Otherwise is the same old canis canem non est

~~~
Nasrudith
No, piracy is if Amazon raids mercantile ships for their goods. If we can just
start willy nilly assigning offenses with worse connotations then what is to
stop absursity like referring to bouncing checks as treason or delinquent
parking tickets as child molestation?

Hell many of the "counterfeits" are really unauthorized production because
they were made by the same factories they outsourced to. Counterfeiting
implies reproduction and presenting it as the original. When they gave the
specs themselves to the manufacturer that isn't a reproduction. The brand
holders themselves have undermined the meaning of counterfeiting by not being
the manufacturer. Granted the ethical thing to do is to launch their own
"knock off" brand.

Besides those rates only work against those massively legally outgunned - they
are bullying rates. It isn't a solution but a sign that the system is
massively messed up. The whole point of it is consistent enforcement based
upon facts and rules and to not be might makes right.

~~~
eecc
Uhm, oh sorry! I apologize profusely if I might have hurt anyone's feelings
concerning the meticulous use of unambiguously well defined terms:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_infringement#"Piracy...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_infringement#"Piracy")

Dude, get over it (and yourself.)

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carlmr
I already received a counterfeit book. The printing quality and alignment
looked like it was copied.

Amazon doesn't even have the option to say it wasn't delivered but instead a
fake was delivered.

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cafard
Yes.

My wife's former employer spent a certain amount of effort tracking down
counterfeits and having them removed from Amazon, or anyway trying to have
them removed.

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garganzol
Buying books from established offline book stores through Amazon works good
for me. Not the cheapest option but the results are worth it.

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cayblood
Seems like they could greatly reduce fraud by using RFID stickers to
authenticate manufacturer-authorized products.

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lucb1e
RFID is the same as a barcode, just that you don't need an optical reader (or
line of sight, even). Did you mean NFC with some signature scheme, or did you
mean a unique code like a barcode or RFID to track an item individually?

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qmr
I received a counterfeit copy of a college textbook.

Amazon support didn't care at all.

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ycombinete
I do not trust Amazon for any purchase where I value authenticity.

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Zamicol
Rate limited. What does it say?

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KibbutzDalia
We can fix this with blockchain and Rust, right?

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developuh
To someone who is not well versed with these technologies, how do these solve
this issue ? I would like to understand these technologies better

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StreamBright
This would be one really good use case for blockchain. Fighting counterfeit
and forcing Amazon to take action.

