It costs businesses hundreds of thousands of dollars a year, plagues Government agencies with chronic headaches and, at the same time, can threaten the very safety of millions of consumers.
Local counterfeiters utilize various methods to hawk their bogus products.
Manufacturers' warnings can be altered and expiry dates continually updated, empty bottles of imported liquor can be refilled with home-made beverages while the logos of popular brands can be duplicated. The counterfeiters' increasing sophistication is particularly troubling for legitimate manufacturers. Counterfeiters used to extract a part of A-One's genuine MSG and refill the package with fake contents. Sometimes counterfeiters can come at the expense of a consumer's life. Well-known local products have also been attacked by counterfeiters in an undeclared war on brand identity.