NBA cautions fans to be wary of counterfeit All-Star tickets
With basketball fans from across the country heading to New Orleans this week for NBA All-Star 2014 on Sunday, Feb. 16, at New Orleans Arena, the National Basketball Association (NBA) has cautioned unsuspecting fans against counterfeiters attempting to sell unauthorized and poorly made knock-off merchandise. Counterfeiters not only victimize legitimate retailers in the New Orleans area, they also take advantage of basketball fans who believe they are purchasing authentic NBA gear, only to later learn they have purchased merchandise of inferior quality. Counterfeiters target major events, such as the NBA All-Star Game, where fans are eager to take home a memorable keepsake.
http://www.nola.com/nbaallstar/index.ssf/2014/02/nba_cautions_fans_to_be_wary_o.html
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Smuggling of tiles hits local industry
KARACHI: Imported, smuggled and under-invoiced tiles have captured 35-40 per cent of the market with Chinese and Iranian tiles easily available across the country. The heavy influx of smuggled Iranian tiles has not only compelled many local manufacturers to reduce their production, but also caused massive revenue losses to the national kitty. A spokesperson of Pakistan Ceramics Manufacturers Association told Dawn on Saturday that these tiles were getting clearance from Balochistan at undervalued prices as low as $0.06 (Rs7) per square metre on payment of taxes (duty, sales tax, income tax) of Rs6 per square metre. While a locally-produced ceramic tile on an average pays Rs100 per square metre in sales tax. He said over a million metres of Iranian tiles were imported/cleared in the last six to seven months at such low values.
http://www.dawn.com/news/1085838/smuggling-of-tiles-hits-local-industry
Lear MoreGlobal economy loses $6b annually to counterfeit mobile phones
While the global economy loses about $6 billion annually to the menace of counterfeit phones coming through the grey market, according to latest Mobile Manufacturers Forum, (MMF), report, Samsung Electronics has said that it would deepen partnership with the relevant authorities and vendors in Nigeria to tackle influx of fake phones. The new report by MMF showed that in 2013, no fewer than 148 million counterfeit mobile devices were sold through visible retail sites, with many more expected to be sold in unofficial retail outlets, online auction websites and in local black markets worldwide. A grey market is the trade of a commodity through distribution channels which, while legal, are unofficial, unauthorized, or unintended by the original manufacturer. The most common type of grey market is the sale of imported goods brought by small import companies or individuals not authorized by the manufacturer.
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Organ Smuggling: Turkish Hospitals Traffic Injured Syrian Citizens’ Organs
Were it not for the well-documented terrorism and atrocities that we know are being committed by Turkey’s Erdogan government in Syria, we might pass over as political fiction the hand-me-down news report (below) about injured Syrians being robbed of their organs when taken to Turkey’s public hospitals for treatment. But in the context of Turkey’s role in supporting and arming the terrorists to overthrow the Assad government in Syria and its history with trafficking human organs, there’s reason enough to take the report seriously.
Russians Drank 10M Litres of Counterfeit Whiskey in 2013
Russian retailers sold 9.9 million litres of whiskey more than the country imported in 2013, according to official statistics that indicate a lucrative market in counterfeit alcohol. The State Statistics Service figures were reported Friday by RBC business news website. The counterfeit whiskey market may be worth at least 8 billion rubles ($230 million), given Russian alcohol prices, the website said. In 2012, retail sales of whiskey exceeded imports by 7.8 million litres. In 2010, the first year in which data on the discrepancy in the amount between retailed and imported whiskey began to be collated, the excess of the spirit sold amounted to 16.8 million litres.
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Fake-food scandal revealed as tests show third of products mislabelled
Consumers are being sold drinks with banned flame-retardant additives, pork in beef, and fake cheese, laboratory tests show
Consumers are being sold food including mozzarella that is less than half real cheese, ham on pizzas that is either poultry or “meat emulsion”, and frozen prawns that are 50% water, according to tests by a public laboratory. The checks on hundreds of food samples, which were taken in West Yorkshire, revealed that more than a third were not what they claimed to be, or were mislabelled in some way. Their results have been shared with the Guardian. Testers also discovered beef mince adulterated with pork or poultry, and even a herbal slimming tea that was neither herb nor tea but glucose powder laced with a withdrawn prescription drug for obesity at 13 times the normal dose.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/07/fake-food-scandal-revealed-tests-products-mislabelled
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Fake mobile phones are a $6bn market, says MMF
The counterfeit mobile phone market is hard to quantify but could be as much as $6bn a year, according to a new report from the Mobile Manufacturers Forum. The MMF – an international association of telecommunications equipment manufacturers – estimates that around 148 million counterfeit or substandard mobile devices were sold through ‘visible retail sites’ last year, with many more changing hands via the Internet and local black markets. The white paper suggest that governments “do not yet fully understand the scope and nature of the problem” and sets out to describe the impact of the illicit trade on consumers, governments themselves and private industry.
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Boss dubbed ‘Loadsamoney’ faces going bust after his family were ordered to pay back £400,000 from their counterfeit clothing racket
The jailed drug-dealing boss of a clothing racket faces ruin after he and his family were ordered to pay back more than £400,000 of the profits of their criminal enterprises. Mohammed Basit Chaudhry, 26, was convicted last year of running a counterfeit clothing racket and trafficking cannabis after raids on his family home in Chorlton, Manchester. He had boasted of his ill-gotten gains by posing for a picture waving a thick wad of £10 notes, prompting comparisons with the ‘Loadsamoney’ character played by Harry Enfield in the Eighties.
Lear MoreNew EU law clamps down on fake goods
A change in European law means that customs now have the right to seize and destroy fake goods bought from outside Europe. The BBC’s Dominic Laurie spoke with is Steve Kuncewicz, an intellectual property lawyer, to discuss the implications of this change in the law for customers.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-26080135
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Jolly, tobacco front smokes public again
It is an open secret that tobacco firms deliberately aid cigarette smuggling, for instance, by manufacturing excess cigarettes to flood the illicit market, primarily to keep their products at affordable pricing on the black market. That did not stop tobacco-funded campaigner, Richard Jolly, from trying to smoke the public regarding the illicit tobacco situation; in fact, he even accuses the Hong Kong police and customs of supposed inaction.
http://tobacco.cleartheair.org.hk/?p=8015
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