Chung Hwa is a famous wood—rod pencil brand.

The 500,000 pencils, together worth 150,000 yuan recently seized by police affiliated to the local administration bureau of industry and commerce in Nanchang, in east China’s Jiangxi Province, once again testifies to the fact that famous brands are often vulnerable to competition from counterfeit products.

China First Pencil Company verified at the end of March that they hadn’t manufactured any of the seized pencils, and that their trademark had been illegally used.

A Jiangxi provincial news website reports the pencils were transported with a good delivery note marked “spare parts” from Jinan, in east China’s Shandong province. The counterfeit pencils were discovered when found in the middle of the dividing process, prior to being transported throughout the province.

However, the recipient of the fake pencil bundles remains unavailable for investigation.

Counterfeit pencils cause harm in the national examinations, including the college entrance test, due to computers’ inability to see through their smears.

China’s aviation regulator on Wednesday confirmed nearly 200 pilots had falsified their work histories, but said the problems were resolved in 2008 and warned future violations would be dealt with severely.

The Civil Aviation Administration of China, in a notice on its website, said officials had spoken of the problem to demonstrate the importance the agency places on safety, as it carries out an investigation into an Aug. 24 crash, the country’s worst in several years.

It was the first official comment by CAAC about the allegations since the newspaper China Business News reported Monday that 200 pilots working for airlines desperate for staff at a time of fast industry expansion had falsified their resumes.

The report cited Li Jiaxiang, head of the CAAC as making the comment during a recent teleconference.

CAAC’s statement said 192 pilots were found to have engaged in work for which they did not have the required experience and that the administration had “severely dealt with the situation” in 2008.

Li’s comments were meant as a warning for the industry, it said.

“China’s regulations do not tolerate any acts of fraud and any discovery of such problems in the future will be dealt with severely,” it said. No such problems had been discovered recently, the notice said.

The China Business News report said that 103 of the pilots whose qualifications were found to be faked were employed by Shenzhen Airlines, the parent company of the carrier involved in the Aug. 24 crash, which killed 42 people and injured 54. But the CAAC statement did not mention that allegation.

It said pilot qualifications were among the key issues being examined in the current probe into that accident.

China’s aviation regulator on Wednesday confirmed nearly 200 pilots had falsified their work histories, but said the problems were resolved in 2008 and warned future violations would be dealt with severely.

The Civil Aviation Administration of China, in a notice on its website, said officials had spoken of the problem to demonstrate the importance the agency places on safety, as it carries out an investigation into an Aug. 24 crash, the country’s worst in several years.

It was the first official comment by CAAC about the allegations since the newspaper China Business News reported Monday that 200 pilots working for airlines desperate for staff at a time of fast industry expansion had falsified their resumes.

The report cited Li Jiaxiang, head of the CAAC as making the comment during a recent teleconference.

CAAC’s statement said 192 pilots were found to have engaged in work for which they did not have the required experience and that the administration had “severely dealt with the situation” in 2008.

Li’s comments were meant as a warning for the industry, it said.

“China’s regulations do not tolerate any acts of fraud and any discovery of such problems in the future will be dealt with severely,” it said. No such problems had been discovered recently, the notice said.

The China Business News report said that 103 of the pilots whose qualifications were found to be faked were employed by Shenzhen Airlines, the parent company of the carrier involved in the Aug. 24 crash, which killed 42 people and injured 54. But the CAAC statement did not mention that allegation.

It said pilot qualifications were among the key issues being examined in the current probe into that accident.

Knowing cultural view of virginity, Chinese women try surgical restoration

By Keith B. Richburg in beijing
Tuesday, August 17, 2010; A06

China has long been known as the land of fakes — Rolexes, DVDs, handbags and designer clothes.

Add a new one to the list: fake virgins.

A growing number of Chinese women — mostly in their 20s and about to get married — are opting for a surgical procedure called “hymen restoration,” which returns the hymen to its condition before it was ruptured, which typically occurs during first sexual contact but can also happen while playing sports or doing other strenuous activities.

Even as China has flung open its doors to the West and modernized, a deeply conservative and chauvinistic attitude persists. Many men, including white-collar professionals, say they want to marry a virgin. And increasingly liberated Chinese women have found a way to oblige them.

“We can fix it so everything is perfect, so the men can believe they are marrying virgins,” said Zhou Hong, a physician and director of gynecology at the Beijing Wuzhou Women’s Hospital. “We don’t advertise it; we don’t publicize it.”

Zhou, 44, said most of her patients are sexually active young women who are about to marry and have told their future husbands they are virgins. She said a smaller number want to forget a bad relationship and “start over,” and a few have been victims of rape.

Zhou is one of many Chinese doctors performing the procedure, which is also done in other countries. She said she restores as many as 20 hymens a month, and the number is increasing. For as little as 5,000 renminbi, or about $737, for a 20-to-30-minute procedure, Zhou is giving women a second chance at having a first time.

Does she worry that she is encouraging people to start their marriages with a lie? “It’s just a white lie,” Zhou said. And she blames men for having unrealistic expectations.

(Firework factory explosion, donkey refuge and more in Day in Photos)

“I don’t agree with this value” placed on virginity, Zhou said. “It’s unfair to the women. The men are not virgins. But we can’t change this male-privileged society.”

The surgery, known as hymenoplasty, has been around for years, although it is considered rare and is illegal in some countries. It is performed primarily in Muslim countries, where the traditionalists place a high value on a woman’s virginity. It also has become common in France among French Muslims, usually for young women about to enter a traditional marriage. There are no statistics available in China on how often the surgery is performed. But sociologists and other experts, as well as anecdotal evidence, suggest it has gained in popularity.

For women who do not want to have surgery, a cheaper, faster path to “revirgination” is available in most sex novelty shops: a Chinese-made artificial hymen that purports to create a physical sensation for the man and emit fake blood when ruptured.

A 25-year-old woman from Guiyang recently bought several online, intending to resell them to young women in her circle. Some of her friends, she said, were worried that their boyfriends might leave if the truth about their virginity was known.

“It’s really worthless for couples to break up over this small issue,” said the woman, who asked not to be quoted by name.

Some sociologists and others have criticized the virginity obsession as emblematic of a male-dominated society in which women are viewed as sex objects. And they are equally critical of women undergoing potentially dangerous or painful medical procedures to conform.

“I think it is really stupid for women to do this kind of surgery and buying fake hymens,” said Li Yinhe, a sociologist at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and the country’s preeminent sexologist. “It’s self-deception.”

The virginity topic has surfaced in recent newspaper columns and Internet debates. Several men posting comments on a popular Web site blamed women for what they called modern women’s materialism when seeking a mate.

“Women demand men have houses and cars, why can’t men demand women be virgins?” asked one man on the Tianya site. “So, greedy women, remember, you have to protect your hymens, because those are big dowries for you to exchange for money.”

Some men who were interviewed agreed about the importance of finding a virgin. “I really care about virginity,” said Xia Yang, product manager for a technology company. “If you go to buy a cellphone, of course you’d want to buy a new cellphone. Who would spend the same amount of money to buy an old cellphone that’s been used for two years?”

The virginity debate also underscores a contradiction in modern China: As the nation becomes more freewheeling, there remains a deeply conservative core.

“Since the reforms began 30 years ago, sexual relations in China are actually quite chaotic,” said Chen Lan, a novelist and social commentator. “One-night stands, extramarital affairs, prostitution… . All this means Chinese women have more frequent sexual activity, and at a younger and younger age. And this makes men feel women’s bodies are not as clean as before. In these circumstances, men care even more about a woman’s virginity.”

Zhou, the gynecologist, is unruffled by the controversy.

She said that she hears from satisfied clients after they are married, women who text-message her to say that the wedding night was a success.

“That’s the happiest thing for us,” she said.

SHANGHAI, China—”I’m here to find a lesbian, to be with me and to build a home,” No. 11 says to the crowd clustered on floor cushions at a sunlit yoga studio in Shanghai. No. 11 is a muscular man in a flannel shirt and cargo pants, and he easily commands the attention of the crowd of 40 or so young men and women who are gingerly sipping glasses of wine and whispering to their neighbors.

“In my view, a 30-year-old man should start thinking about having a family, but two men can’t hold each other’s hands in the street. We’re not allowed to be a family,” he says. The crowd nods.

I’m at a fake-marriage market, where Chinese lesbians and gay men meet to find a potential husband or wife. In China, the pressure to form a heterosexual marriage is so acute that 80 percent of China’s gay population marries straight people, according to sexologist Li Yinhe, a professor at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. To avoid such unions, six months ago, Shanghai’s biggest gay Web site, inlemon.cn, started to hold marriage markets once a month.

Thirty minutes earlier, I triple-checked the address scrawled in my notebook. The studio—located in a high-rise apartment complex—seems an unlikely spot for a fake-marriage market. “The boss of the yoga studio is very kind to us,” says Fen Ye, my guide. Slipping off my shoes at the doorway, I pad up stairs lined with Buddhas in the red plastic flip-flops provided. When Fen slides open a door to reveal men and women chatting quietly, conversation falters. “They weren’t expecting a foreigner,” he whispers, adding, “and don’t tell anyone you’re a reporter. I’ll just say you’re my lesbian friend.” He bustles me to a cushion on the floor and hands me a glass of Chinese red wine.

Precautions are necessary for an event like this. Though there are an estimated 30 million to 40 million gay people in China—there has been no official count—even simple actions such as trying to access Wikipedia’s “LGBT” page often result in a “This webpage is not available” message. Chinese society has adopted a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. A 2007 survey by Li Yinhe found that 70 percent of Chinese people think homosexuality is either “a little” or “completely” wrong, and only 7.5 percent of respondents said they knew a gay person.

While past generations buried their sexuality in straight marriages, the people gathered at the yoga studio are trying a new approach. No. 8 (the men sport numbered buttons in a pleasing shade of blue, the women’s are pink), a pretty 22-year-old woman with curly dyed chestnut hair, skinny jeans, and Snoopy slippers wants a fake marriage to ease parental pressure, but she doesn’t want a baby. No. 15, a strikingly tall man with side-swept bangs, says: “I want to get married for my parents, but I think lying to them will make me feel terrible. So I want to have a fake marriage with a lesbian girl, but just for one or two years, and then I want a divorce to show my parents that I am not a marriage type.” There’s one constant: All the participants talk about pleasing their parents.

Influential Zhou Dynasty Confucian scholar Mencius said that the “most serious” way to be unfilial is to not produce an heir. It’s an idea that still reverberates through China’s family-centric culture. In contemporary slang, single women over the age of 27 are known as sheng nu or “leftovers.”

“I could absolutely not come out to my parents. If I could tell them I was gay, I wouldn’t have needed to get married,” says my guide, 30-year-old Fen, as we sit in a converted Shanghainese shikumen lane house near the popular tourist spot People’s Park. We’re talking about his lesbian wife, whom he met on inlemon.cn.

“I had a big, traditional Chinese wedding. It lasted for three days, and there were maybe 500 people there. My parents were so happy,” says Fen, who knew his wife for seven months before they married. “In your job, in your social life, and for family gatherings, you need to bring a partner. It’s hard to do these things alone in China. My grandfather and grandmother … everyone was waiting for me to get married. The wedding felt like a task I needed to accomplish, something I needed to get through step-by-step, a bit like doing homework.”

For many gay men, the chance to experience parenthood—and to provide a grandchild for longing parents—is a distinct advantage of these unions. At the yoga studio marriage market, almost every man says he wants a baby, Fen included. “[On the Web site] I said that I didn’t want to have a sex life with my wife—absolutely none.” Although he says he and his wife are not “very good friends,” they have discussed having a child. “For a baby we will maybe use artificial insemination,” he says.

Past generations did things differently. The Lai Lai dancehall, in a rundown corner of Shanghai’s Hongkou district, is a refuge for gay but married men. Every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday night, about 200 men crowd the dance floor in their mismatched suits, twirling together in the green light and cigarette smoke. When they’re not dancing, they sit in groups around the edge, nursing flasks of tea, though beer is available for 75 cents a glass.

Zhang, who is 55 and married with children, goes every week. “You can find gay bars in every city, but a dancehall like this only in Shanghai,” he says. While tinny speakers rattle out familiar patriotic songs, the dancing stays elegant and refined. Flirting is discreet, barely noticeable. “Older gay men feel comfortable in this place,” Zhang tells me. “Because the dancehall starts early, they can go home to their families and keep it secret. Though sometimes the wives come to look for their husbands, and then other people have to persuade them that their husband is just dancing.”

But 30-year-old Mu Mu knew that her husband was not “just dancing.” Just after she became pregnant, Mu Mu’s husband started openly dating men. “I knew he was gay before we got married,” says the Shanghai resident over the phone to protect her anonymity. “But the word gay was really strange to me. I read that being gay is something you’re born as, but other people said it’s like a disease that can be healed. Because I loved him a lot, I hoped that maybe he would change.” It wasn’t until a year after the birth of their daughter, and after her husband brought home another man to live with them, that Mu Mu left him.

Mu Mu is one of China’s estimated 16 million to 25 million “homowives”—or tongqi in pinyin(the word is an amalgamation of the Mandarin for gay and wife)—women who are married to gay men.

“The happiest time of our marriage was when I gave birth to our daughter,” says Mu Mu. “That one week when I was in the hospital, he took care of me and the baby. Much of the rest of the time I felt abandoned.”

For many women, speaking out about their gay husbands is more difficult than staying in loveless marriages, but in the last few years Web-based support groups have started to form. Li, 33, is a volunteer on a homowifesupport forum on QQ, a Chinese social networking site. Her job involves giving advice and answering questions, and she is often the only person the homowives confide in. “The women are desperate,” she explains over iced tea on a busy shopping street in central Shanghai. “At first they feel shock, and they don’t know what to do, because people don’t know much about gay people. They think their husband is a disturbed person.”

While it’s relatively easy to get divorced in China, Li says, many women stick with the marriages for complicated reasons. “Some stay because they still love their husband. He’s a good person, and a good father, and they want their children to have a father,” she says. Another reason is social stigma. “Most of the women can’t go to their friends, they don’t think they will be able to accept it or understand. Which is true. I think in China people make a moral judgment about it. [The women] think people will think, ‘Wow, your husband would prefer to be with a man than with you—what a loser.’ “

But there are tentative signs of change. Pink Space, a Beijing-based sexuality research center, started a support group for homowives earlier this year—the first of its kind in China. Zhang Beichan, a director at the China Sexology Association, thinks the homowife “problem” is shrinking. “In 2005, a TV station put out a program about gay issues, and I introduced a homowife who talked about her problems. This was one of the first times this issue was introduced to the public. It had a very big impact—some gay men still share that program with their families when they are pressured into getting married. Also, there are more and more gay men coming out of the closet, and more awareness of gay issues.”

Back at the fake-marriage market, Fen Yu and his friends see themselves as the “transitional” generation. While they can’t come out to their parents, they can, at least, be open about their sexuality among friends, go to gay bars, and date. “For the generation after ours, it might be easier,” he says, “Our parents have no idea what homosexuality is. It’s very difficult, because it’s just opening up.”

If Fen becomes a father, his will be a different approach: “I might not be able to tell my parents,” he says, “but when my child grows up, I will tell them the real story about why it happened and who I am.”

(Reuters) - Up to half of the water used in water coolers across China’s capital could be “fake”, or not as pure as its manufacturers claim, state media said on Tuesday of the latest in a series of health scares.

The bogus water was either tap water or purified water of miscellaneous small brands poured into empty barrels sealed with quality standard marks, the China Daily said, quoting Liu Xiaoyun, the Beijing sales manager of a bottled water brand.

Liu said the counterfeits began to appear in Beijing in 2002, five years after barrelled, as opposed to bottled, water emerged as an industry.

Four suppliers dominated the water cooler market, Liu was quoted as saying. Of an annual sales volume of at least 200 million barrels, 100 million were counterfeit.

“Overall, a barrel of fake water costs bogus producers only 2.5 yuan ($0.33) to 3 yuan, whereas the real ones cost them 6 yuan each,” the China Daily said. “In either case, a barrel of water is sold at well over 10 yuan in the market.”

The lack of supervision had given “leverage” to counterfeit makers in each chain of the production process, from corporate distributors to unauthorised workshops and water delivery stations, the newspaper said.

Three years ago, a nationwide inspection on barrelled water found a 22 percent substandard rate. In the most serious case, 80 percent of barrelled water in the southern province of Jiangxi was reportedly not the real thing.

China’s health safety failings have drawn world attention since mislabelled chemical exports were found in cough syrup in Panama and pet food in the United States. There has been a series of recalls and bans on items ranging from toys and drugs tmacfie.reuters.com@reuters.net, +8610 6598 1214))

A fake or “enhanced” fossil is not a new concept. Collectors and scientists have long been on the look out for fossils that are just too good to be true, especially when coming from China.

A recent article in Science magazine though reports that scientists are not only suspicious of fossils leaving the Middle Kingdom but also the ones on display there, writing that “fakes are now finding their way into Chinese museums.”

One paleontologist in the article estimates that more than “80 percent of marine reptile specimens now on display in Chinese museums have been ‘altered or artificially combined to varying degrees.’”

And you thought your shanzhai iPhone was bad.

Although not of major consequence to the average museum-goer, the impact of these types of forgeries is that people lose faith in the museums and institutions that are there to educate them.

• More on CNNGO: Shanzhai iPhone 4 running Android

That’s in addition to the dollars from scientific funding spent to prove (or disprove) a fossil’s authenticity.

Li Chun, an associate researcher of the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Palaeoanthropology at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, is quoted in the piece, saying that he is “disturbed by the sham fossils and the damage they do to science and children’s science education.”

“Fake fossils are like poisoned milk powder that injure and insult visitors,” Li told “Beijing Sci-tech Report.” 

China is taking steps to limit the number of fake fossil in its museums and passed the Regulations on the Protection of Paleontologic Fossils to combat the problem. The new regulations went into effect January 1, 2011.

A fraud artist who cheated students and their families out of millions of yuan for tuition to a fake military school has been sentenced to life in prison.

The Beijing Municipal No. 2 Intermediate People’s Court sentenced Fan Chuili, to life imprisonment, deprived him of his political rights and confiscated all his property.

Fan’s accomplices, Teng Xijie, Li Zongzheng, Liang Xiuting and Liu Jianxun, were sentenced to more than ten years in prison.

From June to November of 2003, Fan offered students, who had failed university entrance exams a place in non-existing military schools, and promised them and their families a chance to become military officers.

Fan counterfeited military identification cards, certificates and other documents, and bought military uniforms under false pretences.

The gang defrauded each student of more than 110,000 yuan (US$13,750), and obtained a total of 19 million yuan (about US$2.38 million) from some 140 students in more than 20 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities.

They offered briberies to personnel in military schools to get registration forms for students and purchased uniforms.

Pretending to be army “director”, “general”, “commander” and other officials, the cheaters even arranged “military trainings” for the students and meetings with the parents of the students.

The court advised Chinese students and their parents to go to schools via normal channels.

The advice came as the matriculation of Chinese universities isstill underway. Almost 9 million Chinese students competed in college entrance examination of this year.

China’s military schools plan to enroll more than 10,000 students in 2006, and the other colleges will also train more than 10,000 cadets. Military school has become a popular choice for Chinese students.

A teacher in charge of training cadets at the prestigious Qinghua University said the successful launch of Shenzhou-6 manned spacecraft and China’s progress in national defense technologies have inspired students’ enthusiasm to study in military schools.

He said the students of military schools and cadets trained by civil colleges will work for the army after graduation. Therefore, they are free from the pressure of looking for jobs.

(Xinhua News Agency July 27, 2006)

Safe sex may not be quite so safe in China. Police have uncovered underground workshops churning out fake condoms in the latest expose of China’s counterfeit industry.

The spread of knock-off prophylactics is rampant, state media said. Users can expect little or no protection even though the condoms in question carry the most famous brand names.

The scandal surfaced when police raided a workshop in central Hunan province that was producing counterfeit condoms. The police warned that the contraceptives had already been distributed nationwide and many people may have already bought and used the poor quality items, risking both pregnancy and disease.

Police are still looking for as many as a million condoms produced by the illegal factory.

Four people have been arrested in that condom bust and police described the operation as well organised in the 20-square-metre workshop.

Bare-chested employees were found using vegetable oil to lubricate the condoms to make them smooth and shiny before placing them directly in fibre bags without bothering with sterilisation.

Since March, the workshop had turned out 2.16 million unsterilised condoms labelled as “Jissbon”, “Durex”, “Rough Rider”, “Six Sense” and “Love Card”. The workshop had earned about 80,000 yuan (£7,000).

One police officer said: “This is by far the largest case involving producing and selling fake condoms in Hunan Province.”

He warned buyers that price was a good clue to a counterfeit condom. One online shop based in Hunan province was offering Durex and Six Sense condoms at 15 yuan (£1.30) per pack of 12. The normal market price for Durex condoms in supermarkets and pharmacies is 49 yuan a pack.

The owner defended his products, before hanging up the telephone. “All my products are genuine and sourced from the authorised agencies of the manufacturers.”

The temptation is high to turn out fakes in China — whether DVDs, Louis Vuitton handbags or BMW cars — due to the low cost of labour and raw materials and the difficulty for the police in tracking down such enormous and spread-out workshops.

Officials estimate that a third of all condoms in some areas are fake. The condom market in China is the fourth-largest in the world with annual sales of about two billion. The market is important in a country with a strict family planning policy that restricts urban families to one child per couple.

You’ll never have to try and tell the real from the fake yourself, but they could still make a life or death difference to you. The illegal trade in counterfeit aircraft parts is one that has caused aeroplanes to crash, and it’s a global black market that means no one has an accurate figure as to how many parts are real and how many are fake in aircraft flying today.

However, estimates are that the total is more than 10%, which is worryingly high. The problem is greatest with commercial planes, but there has also been an increase in fake aircraft accessories and parts detected by the US military on their bases and planes, which could be simple crime or, if more co-ordinated, could be terrorist action.

The Problem With Counterfeit Aircraft Parts

Fake car parts pose a great enough danger, where a failure can cause an accident. But in the aviation business, where aircraft carry 300 or more people, a failure because of a fake aircraft part can be truly catastrophic. Security is important, but all too often aircraft go outside the company to be worked on when they need maintenance, especially with the engines, and that means no control over the parts used in many instances.

If that were the limit, it would be bad enough. But many major airlines have fake or used parts among their inventories, and some even admit it quietly; it’s just one of those things that’s not discussed, for fear of setting up a major scare among the public.

Obviously, the airline won’t know the new part installed by an outside contractor is fake (many are used parts that have been refurbished to save money), and it’s something that takes an expert mechanic to spot.

Luckily, the oversight of the aviation industry in the West means that, for the most part, our planes are fairly safe from counterfeit parts. Compare airline safety records in Europe or the US with Asia and Latin America, for instance, where there’s very little oversight, and fake parts on aeroplanes are commonplace. You’ll find European and North American flights a lot safer.

What Can Be Done About Fake Aeroplane Parts

As airlines outsource more and more of their maintenance, it becomes harder to have proper oversight of the work done and the parts used. That’s fine as long as engineers use real parts, but where the supply chain becomes infiltrated and corrupted by fakes, then the problem begins. It’s illegal, of course, but there are millions to be made each year in this type of counterfeiting.

However much security is employed, people will find ways around it if there’s money to be made - witness the US military finding fake parts, and their security is tight.

The problem is that until crashes and deaths that can be directly attributed to fake parts everything will remain under the surface, although airlines do maintain their oversight - but it’s not, and can’t be, 100%. Once outrage erupts, there will be action. However, it will cost a lot of money - all planes will have to be inspected, and parts replaced where necessary - an investment airlines might be reluctant to undertake.

http://www.spotcounterfeits.co.uk/fake-aeroplane-parts-and-illegal-counterfeiting.html

Motorists are being warned to be “extremely vigilant” when purchasing car parts after police seized counterfeit brake pads in multiple raids on both sides of the border.

The brake pads, branded as Volkswagen, SEAT, Skoda and Audi, were seized at properties in Dublin, Galway, Mayo, Donegal, Belfast and Armagh.

An examination of the brake pads revealed the potentially dangerous counterfeit parts failed to meet the required breaking friction levels. The test concluded the fakes would not meet the European standard.

In elements of the testing, the brake pads were found to have 30% lower braking efficiency than the genuine part.

Anyone who suspects they have purchased counterfeit pads has been urged to report it. Tell-tale signs include any of these words appearing on the pads: Wasserpumpe, Formel Q, Taxte, or Texta.

(Reuters) - Two Chinese brothers have been charged with making 160,000 fake “Gillette” razor blades, the latest in a series of product and piracy scandals to hit the country.

The brothers, surnamed Zhang, were accused of assembling Gillette Mach 3 razor blades at home with family members without the permission from Gillette (China), Xinhua news agency said Wednesday, quoting prosecutors in Wenzhou in Zhejiang province.

Authorities raided the home on July 4 last year, confiscating more than 30,000 blades. More than 120,000 blades had been transported to Shanghai, according to the brothers’ statement, Xinhua said.

“It is estimated the counterfeits were worth about 2.54 million yuan ($336,000) based on the average market price in Wenzhou,” it said.

Pirated goods ranging from drugs and designer bags to golf clubs and DVDs have become a major source of friction between Beijing and Washington.

China is also embroiled in a series of food and product safety scandals ranging from toys and toothpaste to drugs and food.

http://www.cnbc.com/id/43989506/10_Business_Fakes_Made_in_China?slide=7

Although the real Kentucky Fried Chicken can be blamed in its own right for fakery in China—as evidenced by it’s use of an Obama imposter in several Chinese TV ads —the company is also a victim of storefront forgeries. The fake KFC stores not only use the fast-food chain’s branding, but also replace Colonel Sanders with their own rendition .

The fake KFCs may not remain around for long, however, since KFC recently became the largest restaurant company in mainland China, after becoming one of the fastest-growing brands in the country, according to a Harvard Business School study.

 Russian friend of mine has posted this absolutely amazing story.

He works at a hard-drive repair center in a Russian town right next to the Chinese border. A couple of days ago a customer has brought a broken 500Gb USB-drive that he had bought in a Chinese store across the river, for an insanely low price. But the drive was not working: if you, say, save a movie onto the drive, playing the saved movie back resulted in replaying just the last 5 minutes of the film.

The whole service center was rolling on the floor laughing. This was not the first time someone has brought a disk like that. And the previous drives were also bought in China… They opened up the drive right in front of the astonished customer. This is what they saw:

It’s a 128-MB flash-drive. Working in a “looped” mode - when it runs out of space, it starts overwriting from the beginning. My friend said they’re still trying to figure out how did the Chinese do that. Because the drive reports “correct” file sizes and disk-capacity. And the “looped-overwriting” does not touch the other files present on the drive.

The device looks pretty convincing - lots of tech labels and stuff… The Chinese salesman even saved something to the drive to demonstrate that it “works” in the store.

This is the place to learn how to spot fake Gibson guitars. It’s been said that “imitation is the sincerest form of flattery,” but that’s no consolation to you if you’ve just shelled out big bucks for your dream guitar and it turns out to be phony!

Lately China has been cranking out fake Gibson guitars like crazy, and they get away with selling a ton of ‘em on the Net. If you’re buying online, beware of anything coming from China! All Gibson guitars are made in the USA, no exceptions! (Gibson’s other brands, like Epiphone, are made overseas however, hence the low price point.)

Also keep in mind that these tactics may change and evolve over time… just use your gut instinct and remember that if it sounds too good to be true it probably is!

Did You Know? When Guns n’ Roses was blowing up in the late 80′s, Slash could be seen carrying around what looked like a 1959 Les Paul. Turns out the guitar that brought back the Les Paul to the world stage was a copy! Slash couldn’t afford the real deal at the time, so the copy (made by luthier Kris Derrig) was one of Slash’s favorites for years.

Tips for Buying Gibson Guitars:

It’s best to go to an authorized Gibson dealer, and there are some great ones online I’ve bought from over the years. I don’t really care for retail stores because they have a lot of bills to pay (lights, rent, etc.) and they pass that cost on to you and me. eBay is cool, but man, these fakes have kinda flooded the market and it’s always a roll of the dice.