An American user will have to face the two giants in court: he is accused of using Facebook and Instagram to sell counterfeit garments.
Facebook and Gucci are putting up a united front against counterfeiting. The social network and the historic fashion brand have decided to join efforts to combat the abuses of the business that profits from non-original goods, launching a joint international lawsuit against an individual accused of multiple violations to the detriment of both.
The charges brought by the two names are particularly serious. They are violation of the terms of service and conditions of use of the platform created by Mark Zuckerberg (we are talking in this case about both Facebook and Instagram) while, as far as the luxury and fashion brand is concerned, the motivations concern the violation of intellectual property rights, counterfeiting and unfair competition. As it appears evident, these are serious charges that could cost dearly to the person against whom a lawsuit has been filed in the Northern District Court of California and who, now, will have to answer before the judges for his illegal behavior.
Facebook and Gucci, who is behind the counterfeiting
The person accused of such actions is not, however, new to the eyes of the social as those of the famous brand. In fact, in the past he had already used different Facebook and Instagram accounts to overcome the controls and blocks imposed by the platforms in order to continue practicing his activity of selling counterfeit material bearing the Gucci trademark on the two social networks, in fact violating the provisions of the regulations of the social platform.
To respond to the illegal action of the user, both Facebook and Instagram have taken steps to implement some protective measures able to act directly on the IP linked to the account. In this way, the platform has started a useful path to refine its weapons and make even more effective the tools used in the fight against these types of misconduct, even when - to divert the control operations - different accounts are used that are in fact unrelated to each other but inevitably linked to a single subject.
Facebook and Gucci, the commitment against fakes
As pointed out by Facebook with a post on its official blog, the measure aims to make the platform a safe place, not only when it comes to social networking but also at business level. In fact, the measures put in place want to protect brands and sellers, defending the intellectual property of their products, as well as the users themselves who, using the integrated channels or those canonical made available by the brands, must be able to make their purchases safely, without having to deal with counterfeit products.