Gucci and Facebook filed a joint lawsuit on Monday in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California against an alleged counterfeiter. The individual was allegedly operating “an international online business, trafficking in illegal counterfeit goods.”
The counterfeiter had allegedly used the U.S. group’s social media platforms to sell fake Gucci products. In their statement, Gucci and Facebook alleged that the defendant, a woman, had used multiple Facebook and Instagram accounts to promote the sale of Gucci-branded counterfeit goods such as handbags, shoes, clothing, and accessories. In the process, she violated the trademark law and “Facebook and Instagram’s terms and policies.”
This is the latest example of an Internet giant joining forces with a luxury label to fight the sale of counterfeit goods via social media. Last year, Amazon had filed similar lawsuits with Valentino and Ferragamo.
Due to the temporary closure of retail shops during the coronavirus pandemic, online sales of luxury handbags, shoes, and garments have boomed over the past year.
Groups like Facebook eager to make headway into the luxury market and social commerce need to show that their platforms are safe for brands. More than one million pieces of content were removed from Facebook and Instagram in the first half of 2020. It was based on thousands of reports of counterfeit content from brand owners, including Gucci.
In 2020 alone the actions of Gucci’s in-house intellectual property team had resulted in four million online counterfeit product listings being taken down, the seizure of 4.1 million counterfeit products, and 45,000 websites, including social media accounts, being disabled.
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