There are lots of people who don't care if the goods they buy are original or knock-offs, as long as they look like the real thing and they're cheap. After all, what harm can there be in buying a fake designer bag or trainers - all you're doing is denting the profits of the multinational manufacturers. But, as the first of this two-part investigation shows, it goes much deeper than that. For instance, with the counterfeit market now encompassing pharmaceutical drugs, consumers could be damaging themselves, too. Among the more eye-opening revelations is a massive seven-storey shopping mall in China selling nothing but fakes, and a peek into a backstreet factory that manufactures eggs out of industrial chemicals because it's cheaper than keeping real chickens.
Two-part series examining the global industry of fake goods and how luxury brands and large companies are struggling to fight back. The hidden victims of counterfeiting are slaves forced to work in factories, relatives of people who have died after taking fake medicines, and investors and regulators who face death after leading the battle against illegal goods syndicates. The programme also looks at how the internet has led to a rise in the number of fake medicines detected across Britain.
