Seizures and discoveries last week include one in the UK by the Entertainment and Leisure Software Publishers Association which recovered 85,000 discs containing illegal gaming software. The individual discs each contained 200 games which had an estimated genuine retail value of £6000… In the US, Pokémon USA Inc. and Nintendo teamed up and seized millions of trading card game products… Czech customs police have seized a lorry holding a secret consignment of nine million fake Marlboro cigarettes from China… In the UK, counterfeit cigarettes have been seized by trading standards officers, which contain dangerous levels of lead, arsenic and cadmium.

Cases and outcomes last week include an American couple being charged with allegedly trafficking more than $2 million worth of fake luxury goods into the US… A Chinese man has been jailed for more than two years for selling over 14,000 fake Viagra tablets via the internet.

Policy developments last week include the European parliament voting to reject anti-piracy plans to disconnect suspected file-sharers from the Internet, saying the plan conflicted with “civil liberties and human rights”… China’s State Food and Drug Administration has said that online drug sales will be a priority target this year and they will be cracking down on false advertising of fake drug products over the internet… Microsoft Corp. will pilot a program for software that will display “nagging” notices on copies of Microsoft Office that are deemed counterfeit; the trial will first be run on users in Chile, Italy, Spain and Turkey.