A China-based seller was selling counterfeit hats on Amazon. The brand filed a complaint. Amazon removed the listing. The seller created a new ASIN and relisted within days. The brand filed again. Amazon removed it again. The seller relisted again. That loop is not a bug in the enforcement system. It is the enforcement system, and it is built to work that way.
The asymmetry is structural. Filing a complaint costs the brand 15 to 40 minutes if the evidence is organized, and more if it is not, and then a platform review cycle that runs anywhere from 2 days to 3 weeks. Removal windows run 72 hours to several weeks for complex cases. Relisting costs the counterfeiter almost nothing. The photographs are already on their hard drive. The description is already written. Posting takes about four minutes and the marketplace charges pennies, or nothing. Amazon's complaint system targets individual ASINs, not seller behavior patterns. A deactivated ASIN does not prevent the same entity from creating another one.
The gap between removal and relist is where the real damage happens. For a product with any meaningful velocity, even 10 units a day, a 48-hour relist window means 20 counterfeit units in customers' hands before a second complaint gets filed. Each one is a potential negative review, a return, or a chargeback that lands against the brand's listing history, not the counterfeiter's. The counterfeit units also teach the algorithm the wrong thing: the listing's review profile degrades, the return rate rises, and the brand's own listing pays for the counterfeiter's sales.
Amazon's 30-day ASIN deactivation notices that started going out in 2026 are a step toward addressing catalog abuse at scale, but they target violations in the brand's own catalog, not bad actors operating against it. The three tools Amazon offers, Brand Registry, Project Zero, and Transparency, each help and none of them closes the loop. Brand Registry gives access to the complaint tools and the Report a Violation portal, but it does not prevent a new ASIN after a removal. Project Zero adds self-service removal and automated protections, but it only acts on patterns it already recognizes. Transparency is the strongest structural answer, because it requires each physical unit to carry a serialized code, but it costs per unit and it only works for products the brand controls end to end.
The move is to stop counting listings and start counting sellers. A listing is a symptom. A seller is the cause. One shop can carry 30 copies of a brand's products, and taking down one listing reduces that shop's inventory by 3 percent. Terminating the shop removes 30 listings and the capacity to make more. File evidence by seller, not by listing, and build the paper trail that triggers the repeat infringer policy, because the policy is only triggered by evidence of repetition, and the only party in a position to document repetition against the brand is the brand itself.
Until Amazon introduces genuine entity-level penalties, consequences that follow the seller rather than the ASIN, the loop continues. The brands that do best in it are the ones that stopped celebrating individual takedowns and started building seller-level files. A takedown is a win. A terminated seller is the win that sticks.
Keep reading: What a UDRP Complaint Can Do That a Takedown Cannot, Why a Takedown Win Can Make the Next Fake Harder to Find, and Live Shopping, Live Fakes: The Stream That Sells Counterfeits Before Moderation Acts cover the nearby cases in this series.
Because Amazon's complaint system targets individual ASINs, not the seller behind them. A removed ASIN costs the counterfeiter nothing to replace, and a new listing takes about four minutes to post.
Removal windows run anywhere from 72 hours to several weeks for complex cases. Filing the complaint takes 15 to 40 minutes if the evidence is organized, plus the platform review cycle.
Brand Registry gives access to the complaint tools. Project Zero adds self-service removal and automated protections that scan for infringement patterns. Neither stops a determined seller from relisting under a new ASIN.
Entity-level action. File evidence by seller rather than by listing, build the repeat infringer paper trail, and use Transparency serialization where the product allows it. Terminating a shop removes the capacity to relist.