Cartier, Amazon joins forces to target jewellery knock-offs in US lawsuits

SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) – Amazon and Cartier joined forces on Wednesday (June 15) in US court docket to accuse a social media influencer of functioning with Chinese firms to promote knock-offs of the luxury brand’s jewelry on the e-commerce giant’s website.

The on line character utilized web-sites like Instagram to pitch Cartier jewelry this kind of as “Love bracelets” to followers and then offered backlinks that led to counterfeit versions on Amazon, a single of two lawsuits alleged.

The influencer appeared to be a lady in Handan, China, and the retailers concerned in the “counterfeiting plan” have been traced to other Chinese towns, in accordance to court docket files.

“By using social media to boost counterfeit items, undesirable actors undermine believe in and mislead prospects,” Amazon affiliate general counsel Kebharu Smith mentioned in a statement.

“We don’t just want to chase them absent from Amazon – we want to prevent them for great,” Smith additional.

The Seattle-dependent e-commerce large has booted distributors focused in the accommodate from its system, and teamed with Cartier to urge a federal court docket to make them spend damages and authorized costs for hawking knock-off jewellery there from June 2020 by means of June 2021.

The “innovative marketing campaign” sought to keep away from detection by owning the social media influencer pitch jewellery as staying Cartier, but the sellers designed no point out of the luxurious manufacturer at their outlets at Amazon, the lawsuit explained.

Buyers, nevertheless, had been despatched jewelry bearing Cartier logos, the corporations alleged in courtroom documents.

A second lawsuit accuses an Amazon retailer functioning less than the title “YFXF” very last year of advertising counterfeit Cartier items, disguising jewellery as unbranded at the web site but sending buyers knock-offs bearing the firm’s trademark.

These involved in the plan “marketed their counterfeit products and solutions on third-celebration social media websites by utilizing ‘hidden links’ to immediate their followers to the counterfeit Cartier products, though disguising the goods as non-branded in the listings in the Amazon Retail store,” the lawsuit said.

The businesses mentioned that Instagram direct messages and shared links had been utilized to instruct social media followers about how to buy knock-offs at Amazon.