An AI tool may be stopping you from buying a fake luxury bag
Making and selling counterfeit designer products has become a booming business, and a New York-based company has developed technology to try to put some of that money back in the hands of the consumer.
While second-hand shops like Foreign Objects in West Los Angeles sell brands such as Louis Vuitton for 50 and even 70% markdowns, many used designer bags still sell for several hundred, even thousands of dollars. So it's no surprise that many turn to the counterfeit market for their holiday shopping.
A study this year from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development found that fake goods accounted for about $467 billion in global trade in 2021 alone.
"It's a big problem right now," said Foreign Objects founder Will Dietsche. "Designer is expensive. A lot of these designer brands are raising their prices, so the demand for fakes is higher than it ever was."
Dietsche added that the untrained eye could have a difficult time trying to decipher real handbags and purses from the fakes. That's why he's enlisted the help of artificial intelligence when stocking the shelves of his store.
"The devil is in the detail, they say, so you have to look at every single microscopic detail," he said.
Entrupy, a New York-based company, has developed a smartphone app that uses AI to authenticate luxury items, sneakers and apparel. Using an iPhone, Dietsche took photos of "every square inch" of a Hermes bag, uploaded them to the app, and learned that the bag was indeed legitimate.
"It's looking for any little detail that might be off because of these fake bags these days ... they're so accurately done," he said.
Entrupy CEO Vidyuth Srinivasan said all photos taken by users are uploaded to a cloud, which uses an algorithm to train the AI to determine what's authentic and what isn't.
"[Users] typically instantaneously get a response that yes, this is authentic, which means we have certified that product," he said.
He added that most counterfeit products contain harmful chemicals, making the issue a health hazard as well as a financial one.
Entrupy has a 98.86% accuracy rate, the company claims. As of right now, it does not offer services to consumers, but thousands of retailers across the country can use the technology to authenticate items for customers.
