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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Soldner, Felix, Plum, Fabian, Kleinberg, Bennett, Johnson, Shane D
Format: Preprint
Published: 2024
Subjects:
Online Access:https://arxiv.org/abs/2406.05021
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author Soldner, Felix
Plum, Fabian
Kleinberg, Bennett
Johnson, Shane D
author_facet Soldner, Felix
Plum, Fabian
Kleinberg, Bennett
Johnson, Shane D
contents Detecting counterfeits on online marketplaces is challenging, and current methods struggle with the volume of sales on platforms like eBay, while cryptomarkets openly sell counterfeits. Leveraging information from 453 cryptomarket counterfeits, we automated a search for corresponding products on eBay, utilizing image and text similarity metrics. We collected data twice over 4-months to analyze changes with an average of 159 eBay products per cryptomarket item, totaling 134k products. We found identical products, which would warrant further investigation as to whether they are counterfeits. Results indicate increasing difficulty finding similar products over time, moderated by product type and origin. Future improved versions of the current system could be used to examine possible connections between cryptomarket and surface web listings more closely and could hold practical value in supporting the detection of counterfeits on the surface web.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2406_05021
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle From cryptomarkets to the surface web: Scouting eBay for counterfeits
Soldner, Felix
Plum, Fabian
Kleinberg, Bennett
Johnson, Shane D
Social and Information Networks
Detecting counterfeits on online marketplaces is challenging, and current methods struggle with the volume of sales on platforms like eBay, while cryptomarkets openly sell counterfeits. Leveraging information from 453 cryptomarket counterfeits, we automated a search for corresponding products on eBay, utilizing image and text similarity metrics. We collected data twice over 4-months to analyze changes with an average of 159 eBay products per cryptomarket item, totaling 134k products. We found identical products, which would warrant further investigation as to whether they are counterfeits. Results indicate increasing difficulty finding similar products over time, moderated by product type and origin. Future improved versions of the current system could be used to examine possible connections between cryptomarket and surface web listings more closely and could hold practical value in supporting the detection of counterfeits on the surface web.
title From cryptomarkets to the surface web: Scouting eBay for counterfeits
topic Social and Information Networks
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2406.05021