Counterfeit products
Counterfeit products
(OP)
Hi all,
We are facing counterfeit replica of our electronic products on market. I was asked to investigate how can we protect against this.
I have started to look on internet and to get more insight of the matter but I couldn't find real situation scenarios with solutions. I may need more work to understanding better the situation but I was thinking that there are others that have faced this.
Have you implement any protection techniques with results?
Thanks
We are facing counterfeit replica of our electronic products on market. I was asked to investigate how can we protect against this.
I have started to look on internet and to get more insight of the matter but I couldn't find real situation scenarios with solutions. I may need more work to understanding better the situation but I was thinking that there are others that have faced this.
Have you implement any protection techniques with results?
Thanks





RE: Counterfeit products
Do you have a big legal team?
What country are you from? And what country are the counterfeits being made and sold?
Are you asking about building something into your products to protect from copying?.. If so its clearly too late if the products are out there already.
Scratching off chip part numbers, potting,etc.. can only go so far.
There are services that attempt to shut down sites or that specific add selling that product..
and more and more and more..
Personally I think this is smart.
http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2014...
RE: Counterfeit products
To answer your questions:
- We do not have patents on our products.
- We do have a legal team I don't know how big is. Probably not so big.
- We are located in Europe and USA and the counterfeit products are find mostly in Asia.
- I am investigating more alternatives to implement at the moment. We have products that are with low cost and more suitable to be copied but we have just find another product that is much more than a couple of hundred dollars.
I can tell that all these devices have a controller and a LCD display.
Thanks,
RE: Counterfeit products
Is it a work-alike product? If so, then there may not be much you can do about it. If they've stolen your code, then you could try to launch legal tactics.
Maybe roll-out a Mark II version, and keep 'em coming. Stay ahead.
If they're being sold cheaply on eBay, then you could buy one from each seller and then post scathing Feedback reviews. It's cheating as all get out, but entertaining. You'll be caught, so be prepared for that. May have unintended consequences.
Opinion: The FTDI approach was not smart. They're opened themselves up to liability, and more directly I'll bet that Microsoft took them out behind the woodshed for a severe beating (reputation of MS Updates being at stake). They've back away from it; the overly aggressive driver has been withdrawn. It was clever yes, but dumb. I think it's clear that even they now know that it was a step too far.
RE: Counterfeit products
Where are these being sold? Ebay for example can take action.. Your lawyers can send nasty letters.. You can request intervention from customs officials,etc...
http://pages.ebay.com/againstcounterfeits/
Read about what all the fashion/luxury brands are doing..
read..read..read and do what you can afford..
There are a bunch of methods out there and sadly it may cost more to fight it than to just let it happen.
RE: Counterfeit products
TTFN

FAQ731-376: Eng-Tips.com Forum Policies
Need help writing a question or understanding a reply? forum1529: Translation Assistance for Engineers
Of course I can. I can do anything. I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!
RE: Counterfeit products
That said, even if we gave you specifics, it's a losing battle. There is nothing you can do to safeguard your product that I can't break (and you will easily spend 10-100 times more putting it in than I will spend cracking it wide open again). A legal battle is one way to go, but that only works in countries where IP law is solid... Asia isn't one of them. And you still need millions of $s to conduct a big battle... but don't expect to extract any money to pay for that battle unless you win against a huge company (like Apple). Good luck with all of that.
If your product is only a couple of hundred dollars, the profit margin is likely to be quite small... which means funding a legal battle, funding R$D for protection methods, etc. is a no-win situation. You can make it annoying for others to copy you, but if the product makes them quick cash, they'll be happily annoyed.
Dan - Owner
http://www.Hi-TecDesigns.com
RE: Counterfeit products
Do you have a next-generation product in the works? I hope you do - the life cycle of the current products may be near an end. Can you incorporate technology that will make the counterfeiters' job more difficult in the future? User-level security, centralized authentication, units that phone home every time they are plugged into the internet... whatever would be appropriate for whatever devices you have.
STF
RE: Counterfeit products
Dan - Owner
http://www.Hi-TecDesigns.com
RE: Counterfeit products
TTFN

FAQ731-376: Eng-Tips.com Forum Policies
Need help writing a question or understanding a reply? forum1529: Translation Assistance for Engineers
Of course I can. I can do anything. I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!
RE: Counterfeit products
The FTDI drivers that didn't work with the work-alike parts is fair game. Perfectly fair and reasonable.
The FTDI drivers that soft-bricked the work-alike parts (recent news) was a step too far.
RE: Counterfeit products
Dan - Owner
http://www.Hi-TecDesigns.com
RE: Counterfeit products
Depending on the OP's margins, there are ways to mitigate this; it's more of a PR issue than engineering. One could have the driver say, "Oops, it looks like you bought a counterfeit product, with which this driver is, sadly, incompatible. However, because we are such nice guys, if you rat out your contemptible supplier of counterfeit parts, we'll gladly give you a 50% discount towards buying our genuine part, with your trade-in of that nasty, slimy, counterfeit part, of course. In the future, if you have any doubt about the authenticity of our parts, our customer service department will gladly verify their authenticity. Remember, buying directly from us will ALWAYS ensure complete authenticity and elimination of such costly and time consuming problems as you're having now."
Companies have made fairly gigantic missteps and recovered quite well. "New Coke," anyone?
TTFN

FAQ731-376: Eng-Tips.com Forum Policies
Need help writing a question or understanding a reply? forum1529: Translation Assistance for Engineers
Of course I can. I can do anything. I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!
RE: Counterfeit products
I believe that most people actually know they are buying what could be fake parts but they just don't care because cost is #1 reason now why one picks one product over the other.
I think consumers need a good kick in the pants..
RE: Counterfeit products
<< Are there any differences between your products and the copies? >>
My answers:
- there are physical differences that are not so visible for a customer.
- the software code is not similar
- the meters are similar in design and cost with a voltage meter, the difference is that they measure different parameters.
I would like to ask :
- what about a web based serial number tracking system? Is this effective? Does anyone has experienced this.
- we may think of using holographic overture technology but how much these are effective?
We are looking for future solutions at the moment. Could you tell please if you have experienced/used these technologies with success.
Thanks
RE: Counterfeit products
Z
RE: Counterfeit products
RE: Counterfeit products
Our logo is on the fake product. It's actually similar in appearance with some hard to observe differences.
@zappedagain
Our products are not PC/MAC peripherals.
As I see it and after some research there are some ideas:
1. Special labeling with unique ID ( serial numbers ) may be with CRC. Allow customer to verify on web or even using SMS that the product is genuine.
2. Track the product through the supply chain. I am not sure this is possible for our company. I am new in the group.
3. Programs for the markets where the fake products have been found to educate/inform the customers how/where to buy genuine products.
The most I like is number 3 because this would help customer to buy the right product in the first place. I don't like the idea of having a potential customer that finds out his meter is fake after he payed for it.
Any thoughts on how to implement/improve 2 and 3?
Thanks,
Cristi
RE: Counterfeit products
Educate customers all you want (though I imagine educating potential, but not as-of-yet, customers would be a tough row to hoe... and you'll likely to cover less ground than you need to), but that's still a tough pill to swallow for someone who DID purchase a fake unit. Their situation still hasn't changed, they have a fake unit.
Dan - Owner
http://www.Hi-TecDesigns.com
RE: Counterfeit products
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docnam...
http://xternal.me
RE: Counterfeit products
The only proactive thing that might be possible is to list specific distributors on your website or product literature that can be trusted to carry the real items. Your sales staff should likewise be intimately familiar with which distributors are known to be good. Commensurately, your website can list a "Hall of Shame" listing reports of which distributors or channels are known to be carrying counterfeit product.
btw, if anyone does buy SD cards from eBay, there is a freeware program that will brute-force fill SD cards and verify content.
TTFN

FAQ731-376: Eng-Tips.com Forum Policies
Need help writing a question or understanding a reply? forum1529: Translation Assistance for Engineers
Of course I can. I can do anything. I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!
RE: Counterfeit products
There's a randomized code number inside each package that can be sent in by SMS, or perhaps email, for verification, but only once. If nobody has sent it in before and it's on the list, then it's verified and the list entry is tagged. If it's been verified already, or it's not on the list, then the return message says it cannot be verified.
Anyone trying to make copies doesn't control the list, so they'd have to obtain a brand new unverified number for each copy. Buy one to make one is a bad business model.
Not sure if this method might be patented.
An obvious workaround is that counterfeiters could provide their own parallel "verification" system, with their own contact info printed on the package instead. Unless the buyer takes the trouble to start finding the known correct contact info of the genuine manufacturer, they could be bamboozled. I think that the drug companies wanted an industry wide system with a single, well publicized number.
Their application is life or death, so well worth implementing.
Mentioned for reference.