Daily Archives: July 29, 2015

Counterfeit products have allegedly been sold on Alibaba Group Holding Ltd for many years, as well as on Taobao, one of Alibaba’s platforms.

Alibaba installed a good faith takedown program, which took effect April 1, 2015, to deal with the sale of counterfeit products offered for sale. Brands registering for the program have their complaints reviewed in one to three business days, compared to five to seven days previously. Additionally, a customer service official has been assigned to oversee the program.

The International Anti-Counterfeiting Coalition (IACC) has developed a unique financial program in the battle against counterfeiting.  It’s called the RogueBlock® program, launched in January, 2012.

RogueBlock® is a “follow the money” tool that allows rights holders to report online sellers of counterfeit goods to enforcement agencies, as well as credit card and financial services companies.

Participating intellectual property rights holders utilize a secure online portal for sending information that goes through a network mapping analysis developed by the IACC; this is to avoid duplication and to identify suitable targets for takedown investigation. The network mapping analysis is coordinated with government enforcement agencies, credit card, and financial services companies.

The program has experienced great success and that, since 2012, our credit card partners and participating members have frozen nearly 5,000 merchant accounts and impacted almost 200,000 websites.

The program was enhanced in 2015 to include suspending and locking down an infringer’s websites in addition to terminating payment services.