Nearly three decades ago, Amazon set out to be Earth’s most customer-centric company, where people can discover and purchase the widest possible selection of safe and authentic goods. When a customer makes a purchase in our store, they trust they will receive an authentic product, whether the item is sold by Amazon Retail or by one of millions of independent sellers. And when businesses choose to sell in our store, they trust we will provide a great selling experience free from competition with bad actors. We understand that customer trust is difficult to earn and easy to lose, which is why trust is at the foundation of the relationships we build and the innovations we make on behalf of our customers and selling partners.
In 2023, Amazon invested more than $1.2 billion and employed more than 15,000 people—including machine learning scientists, software developers, and expert investigators—who were dedicated to protecting customers, brands, selling partners, and our store from counterfeit, fraud, and other forms of abuse.
The success of our brand protection strategy continues to focus on four key areas: 1) powerful and highly effective proactive efforts to protect our store, 2) industry-leading tools enabling rights owners to partner with us to better protect their brands, 3) advances in holding bad actors accountable, and 4) improved customer protection and education. This has been a journey over many years, and we have continued to find great success in stopping counterfeits.
1. Our innovations in seller vetting are deterring bad actors from attempting to create new selling accounts. Our robust seller verification uses document forgery detection, advanced image and video verification, and other technologies to quickly confirm the authenticity of government-issued identity documents and whether they match the individual applying to sell in our store. These technologies, coupled with continued innovation in our machine learning-based detection, are deterring bad actors from attempting to create new Amazon selling accounts. In 2023, Amazon stopped more than 700,000 bad-actor attempts to create new selling accounts, stopping them before they were able to list a single product for sale in our store.
2. While the number of products available for sale in our store continued to grow, the number of valid notices of infringement submitted by brands decreased. We continue to innovate and improve our automated brand protections, which leverage the latest advances in artificial intelligence to stay ahead of new and emerging bad-actor tactics. These advanced machine learning models use thousands of signals, including data provided by brands enrolled in Brand Registry, to protect customers and brands. In 2023, our team used a variety of advanced machine learning models, including significant advances in computer vision and large language models, to systematically detect many different types of infringement, including improving our ability to accurately detect complex visual intellectual-property infringements of logos, shapes, and patterns. These advances allow us to handle complex repetitive tasks efficiently and with precision at scale. Since 2020, while the number of products available for sale in our store has grown significantly, we have seen a more than 30% decrease in the total valid notices of infringement submitted by brands.
3. Working in partnership with brands and law enforcement around the world, we continue to successfully hold more bad actors accountable—stopping them from abusing our and other retailers’ stores. Our efforts to identify and dismantle counterfeit organizations are working and having a positive, global impact. Since its launch in 2020, Amazon’s Counterfeit Crimes Unit has pursued more than 21,000 bad actors through litigation and criminal referrals to law enforcement. In 2023, we identified, seized, and appropriately disposed of more than 7 million counterfeit products worldwide, preventing them from harming customers or being resold elsewhere in the retail supply chain. In addition to the disposal of counterfeit products, in 2023, Amazon strengthened its cross-border anti-counterfeiting collaboration with brands and Chinese law enforcement, which led to more than 50 successful raid actions with more than 100 bad actors identified and detained for questioning, many of whom are manufacturers, suppliers, or upstream distributors of counterfeit products. This collaboration resulted in numerous criminal convictions, including fines and prison sentences.
4. We are working with industry experts and associations to educate consumers on the danger of purchasing counterfeits. We recognize the importance of educating consumers about the risks of counterfeit goods, and we continue to explore ways to do that. For example, in partnership with the International Trademark Association and DECA, Amazon launched the Unreal Campaign Challenge. The challenge asked students to produce a 60-second video that was a public service announcement about the dangers of purchasing counterfeits. The Unreal Campaign Challenge reached more than 177,000 global DECA members and the winners were recognized at DECA’s annual International Career Development Conference in front of 22,000 students.
We are proud of the progress we have made in preventing counterfeits within our store. This has required significant innovation, and it would not be possible without the partnerships we have been able to build with brands, associations, policymakers, law enforcement, and others. While we believe we have made a great deal of progress, we remain committed to continued innovation and will not rest until we drive counterfeits to zero.
I invite you to read our 2023 Brand Protection Report, where you will find more detailed updates on these strategic areas of focus and the progress we have made in 2023.
Thank you,
Dharmesh Mehta
Vice President, Worldwide Selling Partner Services, Amazon
Dharmesh Mehta
Vice President, Worldwide Selling Partner Services, Amazon
