Alibaba just hit the roof and published a blistering rebuttal on the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) release of the 2017 Out-of-Cycle Review of Notorious Markets because they included Alibaba’s Taobao marketplace on the list. The USTR has the weight of the Executive Office of the President behind it so is effectively signed off by President Trump.
The Review of Notorious Markets names and shames 25 online markets and 18 physical markets that reportedly engage in, facilitate, turn a blind eye to, or benefit from substantial piracy and counterfeiting. They say that scale of infringing activity in these marketplaces can cause significant harm to US intellectual property (IP) owners, consumers, legitimate online platforms, and the economy.
Alibaba refute the report saying that they are doing more to protect brands and rights holders than any ecommerce company in the world, and not only addressed, but went above and beyond, each specific concern raised by the USTR last year.
The number of takedown requests declined by 25% YoY as a direct result of Alibaba’s ability to remove infringing listings before they make it to their marketplaces. 98% of these proactive takedowns were removed before a single sale could be made, and 97% of all takedown requests were handled within 24 hours according to Alibaba Group President Michael Evans.
“We have also continued to take our work offline, providing leads to law enforcement that resulted in over 1,000 arrests and the closure of nearly 1,000 offline manufacturing and distribution locations.
In light of all this, it’s clear that no matter how much action we take and progress we make, the USTR is not actually interested in seeing tangible results. Therefore, our inclusion on its list is not an accurate representation of Alibaba’s results in protecting brands and IP, and we have no other choice but to conclude that this is a deeply flawed, biased and politicized process.”
– Alibaba Group President Michael Evans
In truth inclusion on the Notorious Markets list does seem a bit severe, they are alongside the likes of Movshare, Movie4k and ThePirateBay who are alleged to purposefully and routinely make available illegal downloads of movies, television, music, and other copyrighted content.
Alibaba say despite inclusion on the list it will not deter Alibaba from their commitment as the leading protector of intellectual property worldwide. Alibaba point to the following inforgraphic to demonstrate their ongoing efforts to stamp out counterfiets:
One Response
Ailbaba is not so good, it’s hard to get consistent quality products from China, the first sample is great after that goes downhill from there, it has ruined quite a few Amazon FBA sellers livelihoods and floods the world with cheap dangerous knockoffs, they are really well known for their copyright infringed products.