Govt To Use Amazon's Fraud Laden Marketplace

Govt ignores its own reports and exposes itself to a website rampant with fakes and scams.

July 9, 2020 - Los Angeles, CA – A shocking decision by the U.S. Government's General Services Administration (GSA) allows the purchase of equipment and supplies -- including office furniture, chairs, supplies, and more through Amazon. It is hard to reconcile this inexplicable choice, which allows authorized personnel to make “micro-purchases” or items costing up to $10,000 from the e-commerce site rampant with counterfeits, replicas, fraud, and scams.

For example, a purchase as essential as a $25 desktop, laptop or cellphone computer memory card may be counterfeit and contain malware, key-stroke grabbers, and viruses. The Counterfeit Report removed thousands of counterfeits from Amazon at the request of brand-owners, but not fast enough to prevent 13,000 to be sold to deceived consumers. Many fraudulent items remain.

GSA Administrator Emily Murphy said the three-year contract, which comes at no cost, was “an important step in offering a solution for purchasing commercial products online that protects our federal supply chain against malicious and counterfeit goods, furthering our national security.” However, recent government reports and investigations illuminate a lack of intra-agency communication with potentially disastrous results;

• In April, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative labeled several of Amazon’s foreign websites as “notorious markets” for counterfeit goods -- the first time a U.S. company is named on the blacklist.
• A U.S. Government Accountability Office ("GAO") undercover investigation found that about 50% of the items it purchased from e-commerce websites, including Amazon, were counterfeit.
• Peter K. Navarro, White House assistant to President Trump for trade and manufacturing policy, wrote a harsh condemnation in the WSJ; "when you purchase brand-name goods through online third-party marketplaces like Alibaba, Amazon, and eBay, there’s a good chance you’ll end up with a counterfeit."
• Amazon reports they receive an infringement notice for 1 of every 100 customer page views, and 200,000 brands have signed in to fight counterfeits on Amazon
• Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., asked the Department of Justice to open a criminal antitrust investigation into Amazon.
• House Antitrust Subcommittee Chairman David Cicilline, D-RI, said Amazon’s associate general counsel, Nate Sutton, "may have lied to Congress” at a hearing last year about how the company uses data from its third-party sellers to come up with its private-label products.

An admission to Congress by Amazon's Vice President of Amazon Customer Trust and Partner Support, Dharmesh Mehta, confirms that buyers may not receive products from sellers they order from, but commingled products from Amazon's closest fulfillment center. "Amazon virtually tracks different units that are identical, shipping the products closest to customers. We do engage in that practice." Not a secure practice for U.S. Government operations and national security.

Unknowledgeable buyers, coupled to fraudulent sellers through a questionable marketplace providing products to the U.S. Government, is a recipe for disaster.

The Counterfeit Report, a global award-winning consumer advocate and industry watchdog, found over 230,000 counterfeit, fraudulent, and replica items on Amazon and submitted complaints at the request of brand-owners. Amazon ignored thousands of infringement complaints, allowed counterfeits and fraudulent products to languish for months or remain, and sellers to relist. Thousands of counterfeits of the official U.S. Military Combat Application Tourniquet® were removed from Amazon. Essential to first-responders and first-aid kits, a well-intentioned purchase of a fake may result in a catastrophic failure in a real emergency. Thousands of visual replica tourniquets remain on Amazon, some with the "Amazon's Choice" endorsement or false FDA certifications, awaiting an unknowledgeable buyer.

E-commerce websites have morphed into dubious marketplaces, and therefore are poor choices for traceable, reliable, safe, and security compliant products.

Editors note:
In addition to Amazon, Overstock.com and Thermo Fischer Scientific were also selected for the 3-year pilot program. Overstock.com and Thermo Fischer Scientific are not enforcement targets of The Counterfeit Report, and no data is available.