Crackdown on Counterfeit Products in Online Shopping Malls
The Korean Intellectual Property Office and the Korea Intellectual Property Protection Agency are blocking an increasing number of ads for counterfeit products in overseas online shopping malls.
The former announced on March 20 that the ads include 176 posts from 70 sellers selling counterfeits of the Hot Chicken Flavor Ramen of Samyang Food and its pre-crackdown prevented billions of won of losses. According to the office, the average unit selling price of such products blocked last year is 95,000 won and the total economic effect of its crackdown is 94.8 billion won given that 47 units were sold on monthly average per post and 21,242 posts were blocked.
The most effective way of cracking down on counterfeit products in online shopping malls is by those malls deleting posts when right holders report such products. In the case of overseas online malls, however, it is difficult for non-large and understaffed companies to do so due to language barriers and so on.
In this regard, the office and the agency have run dedicated teams for six years to monitor and crack down on counterfeit products online. Last year, they succeeded in blocking 98 percent of ads and posts requested to be blocked.