Harmful fakes flooding the marketplace
These products aren’t just fakes; they’re dangerous. One of the products CNN examined was a stroller/baby seat combo made popular by First Daughter Ivanka Trump. A customer purchased what appeared to be a discounted version of the product, but found it didn’t live up to quality standards. This particular counterfeit was put through a crash test by CNN and failed miserably. Unlike the genuine product, which is designed to shield young children from the force of an accident, the counterfeit split into several pieces and tore the crash test dummy to shreds. This means the product, a literal baby seat, can potentially lead to death and injury. Representatives from Doona, the company in charge of making the real baby seat, reported to have found more than 40 counterfeit listings of their products. None of the fakes offer the same level of safety testing as the real deal.
More than baby seats
And it’s not just one product either. A counterfeit swaddle was found to include a faulty zipper that separated when pulled too hard. This could create a choking hazard for any baby wearing the swaddle. The scammers behind these products have learned how to play the system by offering products at more competitive pricing. Sometimes, they’ll even go as far as mimic an official product listing to fool victims. It just goes to show you nothing you see on the internet should be taken at face value. Scammers are not only getting smarter, they’re caring less about what happens to their victims in the process. Keep an eye on the listing price. Counterfeits tend to run far cheaper than their genuine counterparts, and that’s often how these products manage to trick buyers in the first place. Also look for poor spelling or English in the product description — a clear sign the product may be a foreign-made knockoff. Normally, this allows popular, acclaimed products to rise to the top, but an underbelly of shady merchants have figured out ways to rig the system so they can get a sales bump. According to reports from the Wall Street Journal, one tactic these sellers use is to send links in social media messages that urge customers to click through and make a purchase. Sometimes, as part of these campaigns, the merchants will offer to pay for good reviews.
