I'm sure most of us would have used a counterfeit product at least once in our lifetime or at least knew someone who was tricked into using a counterfeit product (Poor guy).
Not only is this a major issue for consumers but it is also a huge problem for businesses around the world and it's an even more serious issue if the product that is being counterfeited is a serious one like a professional scuba diving helmet.
Let's look at some concrete numbers
The counterfeit business is booming. In fact, counterfeit goods account for a whopping 3.3% of global trade and cost the U.S. economy approximately $600 billion a year.
Why you shouldn't mess with authentic products
The negative effects of counterfeiting are extensive, resulting in product recalls, lawsuits, consumer injuries, lost sales, diminished customer confidence, and finally long-term reputational damages to the brand equity of the organization.
Imagine that you sell airbags and if unfortunately, someone copied your brand logo and name to sell lower-quality airbags. Then it can lead to lawsuits, unintentional product recalls or even worse harm the reputation of the organization which will leave a long-term effect on the company.
Blockchain to the rescue!
Blockchain helps tackle counterfeiting by identifying proof-of-origin for a product, due to the fact that blockchain offers a safe and reliable tracking mechanism from the creation or mining of raw materials all the way to the other end of the supply chain where the end users such as the adam west batman above can enjoy their product (anti-shark spray!).
Legal enforcement organizations can more definitely prove that dubious products are counterfeit since blockchain can trace provenance, and businesses can protect their bottom line.
One of the primary way companies currently identifies each of their product is by using a unique identifier such as a QR code or an RFID tag. This unique tag can be scanned during each stage of your organization's supply chain and that data can be uploaded onto the blockchain network which increases both the security and the trust that consumers have in your brand.
Once a user attaches a smart tag to a product, the smart tag uploads data for each new transaction with associated immutable time stamps to the blockchain. A supply chain partner may therefore trace a product back through the supply chain at any point to determine where and when it originated.
Now if you're a business owner, you might start to think I there's any product that can do all the things that we talked about so far and more, out-of-box and to no one's surprise (The title of the post gave it away didn't it), IBM's coming to the rescue here.
Transparent supply is a tool by IBM that has the capabilities of blockchain built into it.
But wait, what if?
While it would be practically difficult to accomplish, a scammer could create a counterfeit tag by duplicating a genuine smart tag. However, scanning that counterfeit tag would reveal the history of the genuine item, which would help a customer ascertain that the scanned tag is a counterfeit.
For instance, if a leather purse with a counterfeit smart tag states the purse was sold by the distributor to ABC Purse Company for sale to the general public, yet the customer found the purse for sale at XYZ Purse Company, the customer could conclude that the smart tag was counterfeited.
Get real: with IBM's Transparent Supply
Transparent Supply provides consumers with the ability to trace a product through its life cycle. Once a client is onboarded onto Transparent Supply, they have their own private blockchain ecosystem.
By making use of Transparent Supply, An organization will have the capability to do all the following out-of-the-box.
Conquer the secondary market as well
On the secondary market, blockchain provides a tool for verifying the authenticity of fashion items. For instance, a retail store could use blockchain to record the identity of the original customer for a product sale, and a subsequent buyer could register with the blockchain to record the purse sale to another downstream buyer.
Moreover, blockchains can maintain or grow product value over time because consumers can verify product authenticity without the need for expert assistance.
