United States Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officers seized 1,000+ pairs of counterfeit AirPods Pro 2 devices worth more than $290,000 on the street from Washington Dulles International Airport back in March, the CBP announced yesterday.
Investigators on March 15 inspected four shipments bound for Fairfax County, Virginia, and found more than 1,000 counterfeit AirPods and 50 replica Apple Watches. As is usual for counterfeit devices and accessories, the products were shipped from China. The counterfeiters would have made more than $290,000 if they sold the goods at Apple’s suggested retail price.
While the counterfeit Apple products were seized on March 29, no one has been charged in the case.
“Unscrupulous manufacturers and vendors illegally profit on the sale of substandard counterfeit products at the expense and safety of American consumers,” said Christine Waugh, CBP’s Acting Area Port Director for the Area Port of Washington, D.C. “Customs and Border Protection urges consumers to protect their health and wallets by buying authentic consumer goods from reputable or authorized vendors.”
During the fiscal year 2022, CBP officers and Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) special agents reportedly seized nearly 21,000 shipments containing goods that violated IPR, equaling nearly 25 million in counterfeit goods. The total estimated MSRP of the seized goods, had they been genuine, was over $2.98 billion (USD), or an average of over $8 million every day.