"China 'e-commerce' Used to Smuggle Over 49,000 Counterfeit Items Seized"

Approximately 49,000 counterfeit items imported into Korea through Chinese e-commerce were seized by customs.

Incheon Customs of the Korea Customs Service announced on the 23rd that from April 22 to June 14 (8 weeks), they conducted a focused crackdown on counterfeit goods imported via maritime express cargo, seizing a total of 49,487 intellectual property infringement items.

The crackdown was planned and carried out considering the continuous detection of counterfeit goods among items from Chinese e-commerce platforms such as AliExpress, whose import volume has recently surged.

The main items seized during the crackdown included 11,375 miscellaneous goods such as keyrings (23.0%), 11,221 stationery and toys (22.7%), 4,319 tumblers and tableware (8.7%), and 3,060 perfumes and diffusers (6.2%). Incheon Customs plans to destroy all seized items.

The seized goods also included 539 so-called ‘K-pop goods’ such as photo cards of popular K-pop idols, 432 counterfeit K-brand items including earphones and chargers from domestic major company A, 163 sunglasses from company B, 32 cosmetics from company C, totaling 1,497 counterfeit K-brand items, as well as 10,890 counterfeit items of famous overseas brands such as Louis Vuitton, Chanel, and Dior.

Incheon Customs analyzed the importers’ histories and detected cases where large quantities of counterfeit goods were imported multiple times and then sold through SNS platforms like Facebook and Instagram, as well as small personal stores. Further investigations regarding this matter are planned.

Joo Si-kyung, Commissioner of Incheon Customs, stated, “As the popularity of K-brands continues to rise, public concern over counterfeit K-brand products is also growing. To protect the brand image of domestic companies and prevent sales losses, we will strengthen the crackdown on express cargo from China at major customs offices and actively respond to balloon effects such as indirect imports to evade inspections.”