eBay To Be Sued For Counterfeit Products?

France’s Union of Manufacturers (Unifab), an industry group, is all set to sue eBay and other auction sites, for selling counterfeit products on their web pages.

According to Marc Antoine Jamet, chairman of Unifab, the objective of the lawsuit is to crack down on product pirates and fakes that are making profit, thanks to eBay and other Internet auction sites. Other auction sites that may be sued along with eBay include iOffer.com, Yahoo! and Japan’s Rakuten.

In defense, Bay spokesman Hani Duzry said the company operates an anti-counterfeit goods program and constantly monitors auctions for blatantly infringing products and removes them. However, Unifab insists that eBAY had refused Unifab’s request to shut down merchants of counterfeit goods for the past two years.

The French group has also backed the lawsuit with concrete examples of eBay having sold 2,35,000 counterfeit articles of leather goods maker Louis Vuitton on 340 eBay pages. Unifab will ask prosecutors to seek damages and interest from the auction sites in relation to the alleged losses suffered by the firms, which could run well into millions of Euros. In addition, Unifab also wants to prosecute the sites for providing the means to resell counterfeit goods. The group is also seeking a revision on laws in relation to electronic commerce to make online auctioneers “co-responsible” for the goods that are sold on their sites.