CCC Forum

This story has been doing the rounds for a while, but it is worth repeating here. Nikon has confirmed that in the US some counterfeit batteries were sold through authorised sellers. The story is at DPReview, amongst others, (link below) but I have not seen any explanation of how the batteries entered the supply chain. My presumption is that Nikon US is a subsidiary of Nikon Japan and transacts directly with dealers. In theory, everything should be directly under Nikon's control but evidently someone was able to exploit a loophole in the system.

https://www.dpreview.com/news/481900992 ... -retailers

I do not know whether something similar could happen in this country. A while back I heard of fake Fuji batteries being sold by a third party via Amazon Marketplace at just below the usual price. That is a different situation since other than hosting the listing and maybe distributing product on behalf of the seller, the batteries were not sourced through Amazon's own channels. I saw the listing and nearly bought one of those batteries. Fortunately, I found out about the deception before making a purchase.

If nothing else, the story illustrates the need to take care when it comes to batteries. Established third party manufacturers who sell batteries under their own name are usually reputable and their batteries are safe to use. It is fair to assume that anyone who creates a fake product will not be concerned about taking the necessary precautions.

The EN-EL15b counterfeits are apparently identifiable by some subtle font differences - easiest to see is the E intersecting with the circle in the PSE mark:



It seems odd that someone would go to the effort of replicating the label on the back, but then make mistakes like that, when simply scanning an original label in would (seemingly) be a much simpler solution.

Fortunately my spare battery is an EN-EL15a which isn't in the warning list.

Peter Boughton wrote:It seems odd that someone would go to the effort of replicating the label on the back, but then make mistakes like that, when simply scanning an original label in would (seemingly) be a much simpler solution.

As you say, it would be easy to create a straight match, so I suspect it is intentional. Invariably there are similar variations in the packaging as well. Most fakes will be sold online and a poor quality image will obscure a lot of things, assuming the vendor does not use an image of a genuine product.

Despite many indications to the contrary, China (from where the fakes probably emanate) does have copyright laws and is signed up to international conventions. An exact copy would definitely be in breach of copyright, so minor variations quite possibly are a loophole. So far as I am aware, copyright protection does not apply to goods manufactured by an industrial process. In other words, it might be legitimate to copy the battery, but not the label on it and associated packaging. Law frequently has its own logic which can result in such apparent contradictions. Or the discrepancies with the labelling might be sufficient on their own to avoid legal issues. (A point of caution, the aforegoing is simply a theory and probably wide of the mark.)

A while back, Imaging Resource wrote an extensive article about counterfeit batteries which is worth a read for anyone interested. Amongst other topics, It goes into the whys and wherefores of battery construction, pointing out that even legitimate batteries can occasionally have problems.

https://www.imaging-resource.com/news/2 ... with-risks