EBAY's blatant disregard of the Law is helping kill numismatics

It's required by law if the seller is here in the US, if they are actually in China then our law does not apply to them and they can list them without them being marked. Ebay at one time DID require the items to be marked and at one time outlawed fakes marked or unmarked. But now they do not actively police them themselves but rely on others to do the policing for them.

Sure, go ahead and invade China, find them and lock them up for doing something that is perfectly legal there. See how long they are in jail and you aren't.

Now if you can find their customers here you might get them locked up for violating the importation provisions of the Hobby Protection Act, if you can get the officials to go along with you, or if you can find them reselling them you might get them charged for that. But the original wholesalers that are dumping the fakes here, well they are pretty much untouchable.

 

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I am sorry to see ebay is unable to do a better job at keeping fakes and fraud off their site. I like to buy coins there. Sadly, there are many fakes and frauds in most to all careers. The best we can do is try to learn the facts as best we can.

 

But eBay is a US company subject to US laws

 

Ebay's algorithms now think I like to buy counterfeit coins since I have been looking for them, to get them removed. They have made it a bit easier to find because ebay is now suggesting them to me. I found a seller with about 70 counterfeits listed. I wonder what would happen if i found someone in china to make me 10,000 1998 Franklin "golden presidential dollars" Since it isn't a "copy" of a US coin, could I get in trouble?

 

Not if you are a Chinaman or politician.

 

Wow, I realize this is an old thread but I found it interesting to read through for the 1st time.

We have been chasing counterfeits on the Bay and elsewhere since late 2015 when the so-called “super fakes” started hitting. Many of these are so deceptive they were certified genuine in top TPG holders. Since then we have documented 25+ different denominations/ varieties of these with each having at least one documented example certified “genuine”.

One of the earliest is the counterfeit low grade 4-C Massachusetts “half cent” that I wrote articles about back in 2016 published in both C4‘s Newsletter as well as Coin Week; to many of the responder's points here (and especially Ed’s) knowledge is key in order to protect oneself in the current climate- a big reason we try to get the word out in many different forums.

And these continue to show up- the recent is this internet listed example of the 4-C just this past week; the TPG was notified, the listing removed but that doesn’t eliminate the “coin” or the threat…