Alibaba uses data technology to remove fake listings in 24 hours

Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group has unveiled enhancements to its Intellectual Property Protection (IPP) Platform to speed up the handling of takedown requests from brands and rights holders, an optimised process which can eliminate fake listings within 24 hours.

Alibaba, which runs the world’s largest online marketplace, said in the first month since the soft launch of the IPP platform, almost all cases submitted by brands and rights holders were handled and closed within 24 hours. Of which, more than 80 per cent of the fake listings were also removed, as the new data model allowed for more effective and faster processing of claims, it said.

The remaining 17 per cent were rejected mainly for reasons such as insufficient evidence to prove infringement or a mismatch between the complained listing and IP documents filed.

“Brand trust is core to our mission,” said Jessie Zheng, Alibaba’s chief platform governance officer. “Our enhanced platform, along with significant progress in other important initiatives all showcase the industry best practices that Alibaba is creating for the benefit of all our stakeholders.”

Addressing 180 brand representatives gathered in Beijing for Alibaba’s Brand Rights Holders Day on Thursday, the company also announced several other efforts made to improve brand protection, including creating a single website to make it easier for brands to file complaints and using new algorithms and data models to allow for a more automated complaint-processing, analysis, and product-authentication system.

The enhanced IPP platform is the latest effort by Alibaba to better govern its marketplace, on which more than 100,000 brands use to tap China’s hundreds of millions of online shoppers.

Last week, Alibaba announced a partnership with French luxury group Kering, which owns brands like Gucci and Saint Laurent, to “exchange useful information” and work with law enforcement to “take appropriate action against any infringers of Kering’s brands identified with Alibaba’s advanced technology capabilities”.

As part of the agreement, Kering has agreed to dismiss the lawsuit filed against Alibaba and Alipay, a subsidiary of Alibaba-backed Ant Financial, in the US district court in New York.

Alibaba is the owner of the South China Morning Post.