Some people are committed to counterfeiting, while others just want to make profits —— Revealing the AB side of professional counterfeiters in the food field
Wu Xian recently "hooked up" with a Wonton Noodles — — He bought 3,085 kilograms of Hong Kong-style Wonton Noodles in a brand online store, which cost 49,977 yuan; After the appraisal agency detected that the content of this batch of Wonton Noodles sodium silicate (commonly known as sodium silicate, non-food additive) seriously exceeded the standard, and the negotiation with the merchants failed, the merchants were brought to court and demanded ten times compensation.
The courts of first instance and second instance rejected Wu Xian’s appeal on the grounds that the evidence provided was insufficient and the appraisal institution had no food appraisal qualification. "I will never give up! There must be something wrong with this Wonton Noodles. The monthly sales volume is so large, how many people have to be harmed? " Wu Hao said.
Wu Xian, 27, is a professional counterfeiter in the food field. Like him, professional counterfeiters who take the initiative to look for problematic foods, buy fakes and claim for compensation, and take this as their profession, have formed a large group at present.
How do professional counterfeiters crack down on fakes? How do merchants and ordinary consumers view this behavior? Where does this group go from here? With these questions, the reporter of "Rule of Law Daily" recently went into this group to investigate the current situation of professional counterfeiters in the food field.
Take the road of professional anti-counterfeiting
Threatening is too common.
Wu Xian is eyeing this Wonton Noodles through clues provided by others. When he received noodles with a total weight of over 3 tons, he immediately found an appraisal agency for testing, and the results showed that the content of sodium silicate in this Wonton Noodles was seriously exceeded.
In order to counterfeit this Wonton Noodles, Wu Xian invested nearly 80,000 yuan before and after, which made him unable to accept the result that his appeal was rejected by the court for a while, and also made him realize that counterfeiting still needs to learn from his master.
His master is Lin Yang, a "great god" in the anti-counterfeiting circle, who specializes in foods with problematic additives or harmful chemical components.
Seven years ago, Lin Yang embarked on the road of professional anti-counterfeiting because his friend bought a faulty mobile phone to help him defend his rights. Later, he specialized in the food field and achieved remarkable results: a number of health care stores that produced and sold diet pills added with sibutramine (which may increase the risk of serious cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases) and added sildenafil or tadalafil (a component of aphrodisiac drugs) were compensated, punished or even closed down because of their anti-counterfeiting.
While the anti-counterfeiting circle is becoming more and more famous, Lin Yang’s life is inevitably greatly affected. "Being threatened and followed, I dare not tell my family what I am doing." He said that in order to prevent the merchants or manufacturers who had been faked by him from coming to the door to find trouble, he installed cameras in his door and car.
In his anti-counterfeiting team, a girl who just graduated from college was threatened with a knife, "I will kill you if you come again."
Wu Xian also often receives harassing calls and threatening text messages from some businesses. What impressed him most was a business selling diet pills with illegal harmful ingredients, which sent a text message saying: "My parents are seriously ill and have children to raise. If you do this to me now, be careful that I will die with you."
After careful consideration, Wu Xian replied to him: "First of all, I don’t want to blackmail you. My appeal is that you admit that there is something wrong with this product and take it off the shelf. How many families have you destroyed by selling harmful diet pills? "
After repeated communication, the merchant admitted his mistake, removed the harmful goods and closed the store.
In the face of reporters, Lin Yang did not deny that he had gained some economic benefits by counterfeiting. "If you don’t make money, how many people can selflessly do such a thankless thing? Moreover, the cost of counterfeiting is high, and it is necessary to do component testing. The litigation period is generally long, and it is likely to cost a lot of money, and it will be ineffective in a few months. "
In the interview, the reporter was deeply impressed by Lin Yang’s words: "We don’t just fight fakes to make money, otherwise we might as well sell those problem foods, because their cost is extremely low and their profits are extremely high, but not many people are really punished."
Some anti-counterfeiting methods are illegal.
"Eating goods" holds a group for personal gain
Chen Dong, 25, has seen the other side of professional counterfeiters.
Chen Dong, who was still in college at that time, came across a "part-time exchange group" on the Internet. After he joined the group, he found that the group announcement said: Learning from a teacher can easily earn 5,000 yuan a month. Without much thought, Chen Dong paid the 600 yuan tuition directly to the group owner, and after simple study, he received his first anti-counterfeiting order — — I bought a refurbished mobile phone on a shopping website, and then complained to the relevant department, and the merchant lost him 1200 yuan.
Chen Dong told reporters that not all people have embarked on the road of professional counterfeiters after studying, and some people have "discredited" professional counterfeiters by illegal means after studying. Professional counterfeiters call these people "foodies".
Chen Dong revealed that "foodies" often huddle together. Some people find shops that may have problems online, place orders to buy goods, and at the same time choose the way of only refunding and not returning goods, and get goods without spending a penny, keep them for their own use or resell them for profit; If the merchants have opinions, they will call on the "foodies" in the group to report collectively. In this case, the merchants usually choose to let things go.
With "anti-counterfeiting" as the key word, the reporter can search for relevant groups on social software, and can retrieve a number of groups called anti-counterfeiting rights protection and anti-counterfeiting learning. After the reporter applied to join several groups on the grounds of "newcomers want to learn how to fight counterfeiting", there was an account called a professional counterfeiter asking to add friends.
The routines of these so-called professional counterfeiters are basically the same: it is straightforward to make it clear that apprentices need to pay tuition fees for counterfeiting, with the lowest tuition fees in 89 yuan and the highest 988 yuan. Once questioned about the charging problem, the other party immediately took out several screenshots of "merchant transfer" and said "one single copy".
In one of the anti-counterfeiting study groups, a self-proclaimed "experienced old counterfeiter" shared the document of "eating zongzi for free": search for "zongzi" on a certain network platform, click on the sales volume, and control the price of a single item within 40 yuan. After the arrival, the cooked zongzi are sealed, so if you cut it open with a knife, it will be said that it is leaking, and you will be asked for a refund … …
Some people praised the act of justice
Some people criticize making profits and making trouble.
As the opposite of professional counterfeiters, how do merchants view this group?
Speaking of professional counterfeiters, the boss of a grocery store in Xicheng District, Beijing is full of anger: "Professional counterfeiters are liars! They catch small business problems just to make a profit. It is not easy for us to open a small shop. There are always such a group of people to make trouble with you. Can this business be practical? "
When the reporter suggested that professional counterfeiters found out what food quality or safety problems were in their stores, the shopkeeper refused to reply on the grounds of inconvenience.
Chaina once opened an online shop, mainly selling imported food. In March of this year, users in Shanghai successively bought a large number of goods in the store. She thought it was a big business, but she received a notice from the Shanghai court.
"I didn’t know that there are professional counterfeiters behind those lists. After receiving the goods, they sued the court on the grounds that the imported food did not have a Chinese label and demanded ten times compensation. " Chyna said that at first, she tried to communicate, but the other party refused to negotiate and just said "See you in court".
In desperation, Chyna removed all the goods from the store and closed the store. In her opinion, the lawsuit is difficult to fight. "Even if I win the case, they have nothing to lose, and I have to bear the travel expenses and accommodation expenses to Shanghai. If you lose the case, the compensation is unimaginable. "
There are not a few businesses full of complaints. On September 4th, the reporter searched for the keyword "counterfeiters" in Weibo, and clicked on Real-time Weibo. It was found that among the 10 related Weibo published recently, 7 were voicing the group of counterfeiters. Among them, Weibo netizen @ Idiot Laughs at West Crazy wrote: "How many electric merchants have been sleepless because of a complaint from a counterfeiter to pit money."
In the Weibo account of Wang Hai, a well-known professional counterfeiter, the first article of Weibo was published on October 10, 2019, with a lot of forwarding and comments, and the voices of support and doubt showed obvious polarization.
Brother YK, a netizen from Weibo, said in 2009: "The collective silence of professional counterfeiters is the retrogression and sorrow of our society. More Wang Hai, less harm. Come on, Wang Hai, we support you! Our society needs more Wang Hai to stand up. "
Another Weibo netizen @ 亿亿亿亿亿 said: "Professional counterfeiting is extortion. It will only drive the hooligans in the society to blackmail supermarkets and e-commerce companies, disrupt social security, and fake counterfeiting is really extortion."
Du Peng, a lawyer of Beijing Zhongkai (Shanghai) Law Firm, is quite famous in the anti-counterfeiting circle and has handled many cases of anti-counterfeiting prosecution. In his view, the group of food counterfeiters need not be artificially inflated, but it should not be stigmatized. Food counterfeiters are like woodpeckers — — Woodpeckers catch insects first to eat, not to be forest guards, but this behavior will indirectly benefit society.
"Indeed, subjectively, perhaps the main motivation of food counterfeiters is not to purify the market, but to make money. But when it comes to making money, everyone scoffs and calls it ‘ Fight evil with evil ’ Is it not a connivance for bad operators to excessively raise the moral requirements for professional counterfeiters? " Du Peng said.
Status is in a vague state.
Where are the anti-counterfeiting groups going?
Do professional counterfeiters count as consumers and are not protected by laws such as the Consumer Protection Law?
Recently, the reporter sent a letter to the State Administration of Market Supervision on the main position of professional counterfeiters and related law enforcement, and did not get a reply before the press release.
According to Ren Chao, a professor at the School of Economics and Law of East China University of Political Science and Law, the Implementation Regulations for the Protection of Consumer Rights and Interests (draft for review) promulgated many years ago stipulates that "consumers’ rights and interests are protected by these regulations when they buy or use goods or receive services for their daily consumption needs. However, if a natural person, legal person or other organization purchases or uses goods or receives services for profit, these regulations shall not apply. " At present, the regulations have not yet been promulgated.
The reporter noticed that even professional counterfeiters, the relevant departments have different attitudes towards counterfeiters in the special field of food.
The Regulations on Food Safety Supervision of Shenzhen Special Economic Zone, implemented on May 1, 2018, stipulates that when accepting complaints and reports, if the regulatory authorities find that the complainant has exceeded reasonable consumption or claimed compensation or rewards as the main source of income, they can terminate the investigation and incorporate relevant clues into the scope of food safety risk monitoring. However, it may cause food safety accidents or be suspected of committing crimes.
The Supreme People’s Court’s newly revised Provisions on Several Issues Concerning the Application of Laws in the Trial of Food and Drug Disputes clearly stipulates that if a dispute arises over the quality of food and drug, the buyer claims the rights from the producer and seller, and the producer and seller make a defense on the grounds that the buyer still buys the food and drug knowing that there are quality problems, the people’s court will not support it.
At the same time, the relevant departments are also decisive in dealing with some chaos in professional counterfeiters.
On June 13th this year, Shanghai Municipal Bureau of Market Supervision said in its reply to the suggestion of the No.0451 representative of the Fifth Session of the 15th Shanghai Municipal People’s Congress: In recent years, in the special struggle to eliminate evils, the city has included "professional counterfeiting" suspected of illegal crimes in the rectification, intensified the investigation and transferred the clues of "professional counterfeiting" to relevant departments, which effectively curbed the high incidence of "professional counterfeiting" suspected of illegal crimes.
The ambiguity of status also makes many professional counterfeiters wonder where to go. At the end of the interview, Lin Yang said after a long silence on the phone that he planned to "stop": "I always feel that this is not a long-term solution, and I will consider living in another way."
(Lin Yang, Wu Xian, Chen Dong and Chai Na are all pseudonyms)
(Reporter Chen Lei trainee reporter Sun Tianjiao)