Are you referring to the Kingston fakes and counterfeits sold on eBay or fake flash memory products in general?

For DataTraveler 150 32GB and 64GB fakes (counterfeits and false capacity) SOSFakeFlash has been monitoring and discovering very sad and shocking information. You don’t just find them on eBay. You find them at many internet sites.

Recently near perfect fakes have been shipping out of Singapore – for eBay sellers rerouting to this location. We suspect it is getting Hot in Hong Kong or that the almost perfect replication of packaging might be based in Singapore.

For Kingston counterfeits, it is very sad news for a wonderful company like Kingston Technologies. They have a very long reputation of delivering high end quality memory technology. I have many old machines, that use Kingston Memory chips and when I say old, I mean ancient. I can tell you that the last thing to die will be the Kingston chips these dinosaurs use.

It costs money to develop new products and technology and because Kingston is such a well known brand name and respected, it is being savagely attacked and exploited by counterfeiters.

Members at FightFlashFraud have worked with Kingston to alert them about fraudulent sellers on eBay. Frauded buyers have too. You can be sure that Kingston has had many listings pulled from eBay. However they need proof.

When it comes to brand name flash memory products eBay can’t really tell from listing descriptions. The fraudsters often use genuine photo’s or even more sneaky lately – avoid using the word Kingston anywhere in their listing to avoid queries by members, eBay and Kingston from spotting them. At most they use the word “DataTraveler”. In some cases now they even avoid showing a Genuine photo and use a generic usb flash drive. In this last case, the buyer is beyond delight when receiving a with a DT150 DataTraveler and usually blindly rushs to leave positive feedback.

The strongest indicator of a fake on eBay currently? The price! See FlashChipTutor’ site and also TechChips.

Given that the Kingston Fakes are everywhere on the internet eBay can not be singled out. However, eBay has a responsibility to invest in a few grey cells and examine 32GB and 64GB listing to detect them. Housewives after reading at SOSFakeFlash can. It is not rocket science.

eBay and also PayPal both have an obligation to refund any frauded buyers for Kingston items when buyers offer proof. eBay should set up a fraud unit for flash memory technology and if the fakes are to be sent anywhere it should be to them at their expense. Furthermore when a fake flash seller is detected for selling Kingston items, eBay has a duty to then search out all the buyers for the item, to contact them, to warn them, to refund them, to offer a sincere apology. If they would perform this duty perhaps they might begin to restore members trust and confidence. If eBay continues to resist, they can definately expect legal action to occur against them at some point.

You need to know this is a difficult problem BT. Even Kingston has difficulties shutting down known sites outside of eBay that sell fakes.

All the groups in the FrankenFlash Project, stress that people should only buy Kingston products from authorized resellers. When in doubt, contact Kingston – first. We all advise STAY AWAY FROM ANY KINGSTON ITEMS SOLD ON EBAY until it is older memory chips used in laptops and PC’s. We mean it!

Finally, for generic flash memory items sold on eBay. If eBay does not clean up it’s act eventually they will be in court. The problem with class action suits is that they take years. The issue is NOW. It is also will soon be a 6 year old problem on eBay. Surely eBay does have a few real employees, (besides automated computer programmes). SOSFakeFlash wants them to suck it up, face the facts and address the issue. Not next year, not in court 3 years from now, but immediately. Also to stop hiding the evidence, stop persicuting those who warn others. And most importantly, refund any buyer who submits evidence of a fake. That means last week, last year or whenever. Also to apologize to the member.

As we have repeatedly said BT – if eBay can not stop or control the issue and prevent fake flash memory products being sold, then they must ban them. Period. No more listings for mp players, memory cards or usb flash drives. It’s a simple solution, until they demonstate a will and a way to stop the sale of data poison.

Unfortuantely, they have chosen to bow to fake flash memory sellers, and reap the profits for fees. In doing so, they have lost many members. New ones and also old ones. Worse still, those frauded take every opportunity to sell those they know about their “buyer experience”. It stops people from joining eBay. It causes others to reduce their buying. This also applies to PayPal, too. Both are being damaged as members spread the news of their consumer experiences.

Meanwhile, on eBay uninformed members are busy buying fakes at unrealistic prices. Soon they will be visiting SOSFakeFlash…..

Investigations by the frankeflash project into sales of USB flash drives, memory cards etc have been going on for over two years.

These investigations reveal that there are hardcore criminal gangs who have been operating virtually unhindered by ebay during this time.

Their activities have made it almost impossible for honest folk to sell such items on ebay in the face of the ludicrously low prices flash memory on ebay commands thanks to all the fraud.

Also their terms and conditions indicate that all transaction are “at your own risk”!

http://www.trademe.co.nz/Help/Topic.aspx?help_id=143

Trade Me does have a team working on reducing fraud and other illegal activities. I would worry about other sites – Trade Me can take care of fakes by itself.

Trademe is well known for advertising affiliate links to Alibaba.com One of the largest sites supplying fake goods of all kinds from China. Yes, you heard it – this was an affiliate link on the Tradme site earlier in 2009. It would show up on the message board also. This trademe site is owned by a daily newspaper compnay and is reported as being ‘draconian’ in its attempts to look after its honest traders and ’soft’ on its not so honest mass traders.

The BBC recently reported that a young lad had an ebay listing offering his granny for sale removed. The granny in question (still very much alive) was well aware of the listing.

Of course, if it had been a counterfeit granny (his uncle in drag perhaps) with a fake capacity bosom (falsies) maybe ebay would have allowed it.

On a more serious note we are all cheesed off with ebay not addressing the issue and sweeping things under the carpet – I think we are all agreed that their actions are dubious.

I was just pointing out that they don’t seem to be doing it in response to posts at fightflashfraud.

They need to stop trying to HIDE THE TRUTH from eBay members and change their policies for selling any nand flash memory based technology on eBay!

This sweeping up and pulling listings is driving everyone mad. It is unfair to eBay members! They are aiding in fraud. If eBay is serious, they would be contacting the buyers of fake flash sellers and warning them, refunding too with a sincere apologie. Any thing is else participation in fraud as far as my group is concerned.

They should be honest. Transparent. Don’t get me wrong readers, we don’t hate ebay. It was a great place to bid, buy and sell. It is not anymore. They sold their soul for fees. I could auction my dead grannies corpse. They would not care so long as they got their cut!

Review of fake flash seller behavior and eBay make it clear that information is being exploited. At SOSFakeFlash we have a lot of information that we chose not to report immediately. There is no choice given the behavior of eBay.

The fightflashfraud site is great. Especially when dealing with small time sellers in Europe. Assisting Brand Names is good too. However, the BIG problem is coming from sellers in the orient. To address the issue one needs to discard western ideas. Failure to understand the Orient and how things are done will lead to failure. This is a serious problem in the western world and it pertains not only to fake flash memory items.

SOSFakeFlash introduced a zero tolerance policy in the summer of 2009. Only one report is necessary to issue a formal alert.

Some of these oriental “gremlins” sell more than 500+ to 1500+ items before eBay reads your site and shuts them done. The sellers do a massive listing campaign. In suspending the sellers, victims become confused and as we all know… they don’t know how to deal with the problem of their listing disappearing. They can no longer leave negative feedback. SOSFakeFlash is unable to issue an alert because evidence is necessary.

With private auctions escalating the issue is even more serious.

You should continue to issue articles. But also document for eBay’s potential removal of the seller. Also have your team ready to contact those who left positive feedback for the seller. Remember, it takes ONLY ONE report for SOSFakeFlash to issue an alert and get things rolling.

It is difficult to determine if the gremlins are independents or part of a counterfeit ring. With eBay suspending the sellers we do not get the addressing information needed to determine if they are part of a ring or not.

The fake flash fighting elders have only one conclusion, eBay will do anything and everything to hide the problem. We can not expect that eBay will work in the interest of buyers. If they were willing to do so, they would have been contacted buyers of known fake flash memory sellers to warn them….and ensure that victims of these sellers recieved automatic refunds via paypal with an apology.

At SOSFakeFlash we mention there is a WAR going on. It is a WAR and it is very nasty!

Collect evidence, have your team contact buyers for the gremlins for fake flash sellers in the Orient as you issue posts.

The fraud that is occuring on eBay is unbelievable! It has been occuring for over 6 years now. Just how many Millions are involved? How much revenue has eBay earned at the expense of members? How much data loss has occured?

Top Seller Ratings to eBay fake flash memory sellers? What will eBay do next?

What do you suggest then? Should we shut the fightflashfraud blog down??

What is ebay doing to contact the buyers to warn them about the shit they bid on? 6 months? Sick. Sick, SICK!

Hope someone will contact me. If contact will reply.

The objective is to not make it easy for fake flash sellers to identify which returned fakes have a message and which do not. Law enforcement in marking currency does not make the marking easy to spot – if they did the criminals would just discard marked currency, the ability to catch and trace the illegal activity lost.

Since Techreporters has gone “public” with this idea, the need to make it difficult for fake flash sellers is obvious. Forcing them to check inside every fake would cost them time and money – eating up any profit they might like to make from reselling them again.

In putting the message only inside:

1) the fraudulent sellers lose time and spend in labour costs.

2) the item will most likely need new casing, they may not have readily available, preventing a quick resell or recycle. new casing also costs money. Trying to prevent the fake memory items returning to the buying chain all together.

I think the focus is on making life difficult for these sellers and the secondary one is providing clues and tracing for buyers.

No your post comment was not rejected. Comments are not automatically or immediately added to posts in many cases. If you look at the spam counter for the site, it will be obvious why.

We don’t necessarily mind people promoting their own sites – it is a community. Naturally we will review do an inspection. You would be surprised at some of the odd things we encounter.

PC optimization is a very useful and valid subject. There are a few members in the FrankenFlash Project that actively engage in keeping their machines lean and fit. There is a lot of junk that can accumulate on a machine reducing it’s speed.

FakeFlashNews moderators spend a lot of time investigating. Volenteers as all others on the project, most have full time employment. It is a difficult balance.

So no, your post was not rejected – just waiting for approval.

You are correct John that manufacturers will not give away technology at low prices. In fact they have reduced production at some FABs or halted altogether to clear up the existing inventory.

In terms of sizes for flash memory chips or devices. No one offers 512GB yet, the largest size is 256GB and it is very expensive. Reduced size is a plus, but how long it might take to file up a 256GB is at issue. It depends on so many different factors from the computers cpu, speed of usb ports, usb controller chip family on the usb flash drive.

Information is also stored very differently on flash memory chips – it is not the same as for hard drives. Not certain yet (see in research) is the degree of risk factor for data loss on a flash memory chip drive. We have not found anyone offering recover services for usb flash drives. The question is why. Brand name sites also mention they do not offer recovery services or even recommend third party companies. This is unusual. There are many companies that offer data recovery from traditional hard drives.

We see the speed issue as probably the main bottle neck for large usb flash drives as pen sticks. Some are now hybrid, having a tradtional usb connector at one end and an eSata connector at the other end. The eSata connection is much faster. These hybrid drives the last time we checked were only offered up to 32GB in capacity. There might be 64GB soon. eSata connections rule out a lot of older computers from being able to use.

At FlashDriveFacts, they mention that 16GB and lower are the most stable usb flash drives – anything higher is still a work in progress.

Price is a strong factor from a consumer’s point of view. In many countries is it is possible to buy an external usb hard disk for as little as $80 that will hold 500GB. These drives can easily be partitioned – partitioning usb flash drives are a serious problem. At issue is are the different operationg systems and the file systems they recognize. FAT32 is the one almost all recognize – the common denominator. It has limitations – for example 32GB on windows XP and a maximum size for an indiviual file of 4GB.

Many who work in the project groups do not see usb flash drives as an archiving solution for data. Instead they see them as a transport solution. Carrying files from computer A to computer B. Or simply as a reference where a back of of data files exist elsewhere.

It is unfortunate that so many consumers are not aware of technological limitations, prices or what brand name manufacturers have actually released to market. Sites like DHGate.com are well known as for false capacity items. We would like to point out that there are honest sellers there, only they are extremely hard to find. Like eBay they are buried by the dishonest sellers.

When a seller replies with *uck in respones to inquiries it is very unprofessional and also a sign that the seller is selling false capacity items. These sellers are not happy. They know that the FrankenFlash Project exists and it is making it more difficult for them to sell. Also buyers having discovered something is wrong, research the internet, find our sites and learn the truth. They test and soon go after the sellers who sold them false capacity. Naturally this upsets the sellers and so some in a temper will use bad language in their replies to those asking questions about whether the items are fakes or not.

Sony is a brand name that has been impacted. They are not happy about it and on eBay they have written a guide explaining to members what they make and do not make. When a brand name makes an effort like this to warn eBay members internally, it says a lot. We all appreciate Sony’s efforts on behalf of consumers. We ask that if anyone finds they have purchased a fake (false capacity) item that has the Sony brand name on it, to report to Sony. They need everyone’s help.

I thought it was too good to be true, so i researched it, and this site came up along with a dozen more.

I am an electronic engineer, I do know that it ‘is’ physically possible to make them, but not in the tiny size they pictured.

No manufacturer would bring them out yet even if it was possible. They will want to go from 32gb – 64gb -128gb – 256-512-1024gb (could be 3-5 years away before we see a 1TB flash) even then, the price would be more than $50.

It would be bad world economics if manufacturers made memory that size for so cheap.

I am staying well away from these fake goods.

*off DHgate.com I found a nokia N97 for $280 only 193euro. I should have it in a few days. (fingers crossed!)

If you want some Free computer advice go to my blog at http://www.fastpcblog.com I have a list of free software titles that you can download also, (when I say free, I really mean Free, not that free trial crap.)

I originally was thinking of selling some of those 500gb on my site, but not after reading this.

I personally cannot stand sellers like the one above. The fact that he put F*** in his reply, denotes his unprofessionalism. Furthermore, the best way to make money is make the customer happy, so that he will trust you and buy from you again.

Some people are just stupid. The most successful businesses in the world employ that model of repeat sales. It takes the same effort to get 1 customer to buy once as it does to get them to keep buying from you, again and again. (Once you make them happy, the first time that is!)

Sorry I went on a bit of a rant there.

Peace,
John Devine