One company that makes sunglasses, Oakley, went online and found more than 19,000 auctions on eBay and other Web sites last year that were selling fake Oakley sunglasses. When Oakley investigated further, the Southern California company traced some of the counterfeit to an Oregon man’s house where they found 33,000 more.

“eBay is a huge problem for a lot of us brand holders,” said Vance Lommen, director of legal affairs for Oakley, based in Foothill Ranch, Calif. “It’s also any auction sites. eBay at least is working with us to close these sites down.”

Now that counterfeit goods have become big business at online auction sites, companies are expanding their efforts to thwart it. “We have several attorneys who do nothing but collect the information on the auction sites 24 hours a day,” said Lommen.

The auction sites are the places where small-time counterfeiters sell goods under their real names, supplementing their incomes and hoping no one notices. But mixed among them are wholesalers who sell goods by the dozens, often using both fake identities and credit cards. For consumers, it’s easy to fall prey to them. Counterfeiters will advertise a real pair of Oakley sunglasses in a listing and then send a fake pair to the winning bidder.

“It’s called gray market diversion,” said Lommen.

Posted: 02|20|06 at 10:49 am. Filed under: US News.