- Authorities in New York recently announced the largest-ever seizure of counterfeit goods in the US.
- The 219,000 counterfeit items seized included 219,000 bags, clothes, shoes, and other luxury products.
Federal authorities in New York City just made the largest-ever seizure of counterfeit goods — worth an estimated $1.03 billion.
Roughly 219,000 items in the large scale operation were seized, according to the U.S. Attorney's office for the Southern District of New York.
Authorities said the two individuals, who were arrested and accused of trafficking in counterfeit goods, ran their operation out of a large storage facility plus an additional offsite location, both in New York City's Manhattan. They each face a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison.
Canal Street in NYC's Chinatown is famously known as a place to buy knockoff goods, though it's not clear exactly where the seized storage facility was located and where the goods were intended to be sold.
Photos released by authorities show boxes upon boxes full of counterfeit goods, as well as units with floor to ceiling shelves absolutely overflowing with counterfeit luxury handbags, shoes, wallets, clothing, sunglasses, and more.
Knockoff sales have soared over the last two decades — seizures of counterfeit and pirated goods increased tenfold between 2000 and 2018, according to the US Department of Homeland Security. And the International Chamber of Commerce and Frontier Economics predicted in 2017 that counterfeiting and piracy would drain $4.2 trillion from the global economy by 2022, although one expert previously told Business Insider that the true cost has more likely surpassed that estimate, taking the pandemic's impact on e-commerce into account.