How to Remove a Counterfeit From Amazon (August 2026)

How to Remove a Counterfeit From Amazon

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Fake products have been present on Amazon for a long time. These counterfeits target successful products, often from up-and-coming brands, hoping they don’t have the resources or experience to stop counterfeiting on Amazon.

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Follow MarqVision’s easy step-by-step guide to reporting and removing fake and counterfeit products from Amazon’s online marketplace. 

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TLDR:

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• Removing a counterfeit from Amazon requires Brand Registry enrollment and registered trademark upload before any report can be filed.
• Amazon processes standard infringement reports within a few business days, but Brand Registry processing takes 10 to 45 business days per Amazon Seller Central.
• Amazon Project Zero lets enrolled brands remove counterfeit listings directly without waiting for Amazon review, cutting enforcement response time for high-volume cases.
• AI detection catches counterfeits that evade trademark searches by running visual similarity matching and seller behavior analysis at scale.
• MarqVision automates counterfeit discovery and takedown reporting across Amazon and other channels, freeing teams from manual enforcement workflows.

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Step 1: Create Your Amazon Account

To enforce your IP on Amazon, you'll first need to sign up. If you already have an account, the first step is complete.

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Amazon has built one of the more mature IP enforcement programs among major marketplaces, with tools like Brand Registry and Project Zero available to rights holders. If this is your first time protecting intellectual property online, Amazon is a good place to start. 

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Step 2: Join Amazon Brand Registry

Next, you’ll need to join the Amazon Brand Registry. 

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In short, Amazon Brand Registry gives you a business account on Amazon that provides you with control over your product on its site. It also gives you access to brand-building tools, customer experience, and, most importantly, an IP enforcement platform.

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We cover all the details in our Amazon Brand Registry guide.

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Step 3: Submit Your IP Documents

Next, you’ll need to upload your registered intellectual property documents, including adding all of  your active registered trademarks to your account.

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1. In your account, click “Manage,” then select “Manage intellectual property.”
2. Choose your brand from the dropdown menu and click "Connect a trademark." Enter the required information.
3. (Optional) To upload multiple trademarks, click "Connect multiple trademarks," download the template, fill it out, and upload it.

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After you've submitted all your documents, check the 'Requests' tab for confirmation. According to Amazon Seller Central, Brand Registry processing typically takes 10 to 45 business days depending on the complexity of the review and current request volume.

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When the documents have been processed, you'll receive an email notifying you of approval or rejection. 

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Step 4: Report The Infringement

With your account fully set up on Brand Registry, and all your intellectual property documents uploaded, you can now start to report listings of counterfeit products. 

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Head to the Report Infringement page, and begin your reports. 

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You’ll need to identify the offending product listings with one of the following identifiers:

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• Amazon Standard Identification Numbers (ASINs)
• ISBN-10s
• Product URLs

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Amazon allows users to submit up to 50 products in a single report, and there’s no upper limit to the number of reports that can be submitted.

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Note: Handling huge volumes of reports for counterfeit products can easily become chaotic if not properly organized, especially when dealing with IP reporting across different marketplaces. We recommend documenting careful notes of the infringements you find, and the status of your reports. 

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Step 5: Submit and Wait for Processing

Once you have completed the necessary information and submitted your complaint, it should be processed by Amazon within a few business days, though timelines vary (per Amazon Brand Registry guidance). For a broader look at how long takedowns take across platforms, see our guide on brand takedown timelines. Amazon has gone to great lengths in recent years to keep their brand protection processes smooth and IP-friendly, though it is still much quicker than removing a counterfeit from Taobao.

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Upon submitting your report, you'll receive a confirmation, and the platform will initiate a review of your case. Be ready to furnish any supplementary information or evidence requested during this assessment.

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It's crucial to be comprehensive and precise in your submission, and to verify that your intellectual property rights information is current and approved. This confirms the efficacy of your complaint.

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Amazon Brand Protection in August 2026: What's Changed

The process above remains the core pathway for removing counterfeits from Amazon. In 2026, Amazon has expanded its tools to give enrolled brands more direct control.

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Amazon Project Zero is now one of the most effective options available to Brand Registry members. Project Zero lets brand owners remove suspected counterfeit listings directly and instantly, without waiting for Amazon to act on a report. Each removal feeds Amazon's machine learning system, which uses that enforcement signal to block similar listings before they go live.

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To join Project Zero, your brand must have a high reporting accuracy rate on Amazon. Once enrolled, you gain access to two key capabilities: self-service listing removal, and product serialization using Amazon's Transparency program to authenticate each unit sold.

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For brands managing high volumes of infringements, the combination of Brand Registry reporting and Project Zero's self-service removal sharply cuts enforcement response time compared to manual report-and-wait workflows.

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How AI Is Changing Counterfeit Detection on Amazon

Manual report-and-wait workflows have real limits. When sellers list hundreds of counterfeit variations using slightly different product titles, images, or ASINs, human reviewers can only catch a fraction of them before new ones appear. AI-powered detection changes that by scanning listings continuously and flagging suspicious products based on visual similarity, pricing anomalies, and seller behavior patterns.

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Here is what to look for in a brand protection platform:

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• Automated listing discovery: the platform should scan Amazon (and other marketplaces) continuously, to catch new infringements as they appear.
• AI image and text matching: computer vision and OCR can detect counterfeits that copy your product photos or use your trademarks in ways a keyword search would miss.
• Unauthorized seller detection: if gray market sellers or unauthorized resellers are undercutting your pricing on Amazon, a strong platform will surface them by monitoring active offers on your ASINs across seller accounts.
• Enforcement automation: the platform should prepare and submit takedown reports automatically, so your team spends time reviewing decisions, not filling out forms.
• Cross-channel coverage: counterfeits rarely stay on one marketplace. Look for a solution that monitors social media, third-party sites, and app stores alongside Amazon.

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For fashion and apparel brands in particular, unauthorized resellers are a growing concern. Sellers who obtain genuine products through gray market channels and list them outside authorized channels can erode brand pricing, damage retailer relationships, and create confusing customer experiences. Monitoring seller identity alongside listing content gives brand teams the full picture.

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FAQ

Does Amazon Brand Registry actually remove counterfeits, or does it just give you a place to report them?

Brand Registry does both, but the distinction matters for how you set your expectations. Filing a report through the Report Infringement page triggers Amazon's review process, which typically resolves within a few business days, but you are still waiting on Amazon to act. Amazon Project Zero, available to Brand Registry members with a strong reporting accuracy record, goes further: it lets you remove suspected counterfeit listings directly without waiting for platform review, and each removal feeds Amazon's machine learning system to block similar listings proactively.

What should I do when counterfeiters keep relisting on Amazon after I remove them?

Repeat relisting is a sign that single-report workflows are not sufficient for your enforcement volume. The practical answer is to move from reactive, per-listing reporting to seller-level enforcement: identify whether the same seller is operating across multiple storefronts or ASINs, document the pattern, and escalate through Amazon's Brand Registry with evidence of recidivism. For high-volume repeat offenders, test purchases that produce physical evidence of mismatched lot numbers or packaging give you the strongest basis for a formal counterfeit report. Amazon is increasingly rejecting submissions that rely on digital listing data alone.

How do I remove counterfeits from Amazon if my trademark is registered in the EU but not the US?

EU trademark registrations support enforcement on EU Amazon storefronts but may not satisfy Amazon's requirements on US marketplace pages. Before filing reports against US-domain ASINs, confirm whether your registered mark covers the jurisdiction where the infringing listing appears. If it does not, your complaint is likely to stall at platform review regardless of how strong your evidence is. The practical fix is to treat trademark registration as a portfolio decision mapped to every geography where you actively sell, not merely your home market.

What is the difference between Amazon Brand Registry and Amazon Project Zero for counterfeit enforcement?

Brand Registry is the prerequisite. It gives you access to Amazon's IP enforcement tools, lets you upload registered trademarks, and opens the standard report-and-wait removal workflow. Project Zero is a layer on top of Brand Registry that removes the wait: enrolled brands can take down suspected counterfeits directly and instantly, without submitting a report and waiting for Amazon's review. Project Zero also includes product serialization through Amazon's Transparency program, so each unit sold can be authenticated at the point of purchase (a deterrent that Brand Registry reporting alone cannot provide).

Can AI-powered brand protection catch counterfeits that avoid using my trademark on Amazon?

Yes, and this is where keyword-based or manual monitoring breaks down at scale. When sellers deliberately avoid your brand name in listing titles, copying product images, specifications, and packaging without triggering a trademark match, standard searches miss them entirely. AI detection that runs visual similarity matching, pricing anomaly analysis, and seller behavior clustering against your actual product data at the SKU level can surface those listings. The coverage gap is not in detection capability; it is in whether your enforcement program is configured to catch evasion patterns, not merely direct trademark use.

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Automate Your IP Protection Online

Removing counterfeit products from Amazon and the numerous other online platforms infested with fraudulent knock-offs is a daunting task, especially for smaller brands. Working through this guide makes clear the painstakingly slow nature of the process and the heavy drain on manpower it imposes on smaller teams.

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Fortunately, there's a more streamlined approach.

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Reach out to us at MarqVision to discover how our cutting-edge AI-powered brand protection solutions can shield your brand across the vast expanse of the internet, empowering your in-house team to concentrate on driving business growth and expanding globally.