中國職業(yè)打假人，這條路還能走多遠？

BEIJING — Ji Wanchang strolled through a Beijing luxury mall one recent morning with an eye out for luxury coats. But at one store, a clerk told him a fur-collared Moncler and other coats were “sample sizes” and not for sale.

北京——最近的一個上午，紀萬昌在北京一個豪華購物中心漫步，他在仔細挑選奢華大衣，但一家商店的售貨員告訴他，那里的一件帶毛皮領(lǐng)子的盟可睞(Moncler)羽絨服及其他大衣都是“尺碼樣品”，不出售。

A second clerk, selling a wolf fur-lined Yves Salomon, said the coat was reserved.

另一位出售伊夫薩露蒙(Yves Salomon)牌的狼毛皮襯里服裝的售貨員說，大衣已被人預(yù)定了。

Mr. Ji sighed. In both cases, the fur wouldn’t match their labels, he suspected — and the clerks knew selling a fake to Mr. Ji, who is well known on sight in many of China’s shops, meant big trouble.

紀萬昌嘆了口氣。他懷疑這兩件皮大衣都與它們的標簽不匹配，而且店員也知道，把它們賣給紀萬昌意味著會有大麻煩，他在許多中國商店里都能被人認出來。

“Ma’am, I don’t want to make things difficult for you,” he told a sales clerk, who nodded and bowed. “I’ve found problems with your clothes, so please correct them.”

“女士，我不想給你制造麻煩，”他對一名售貨員說，售貨員點著頭，向他鞠了個躬。“我發(fā)現(xiàn)你們賣的衣服有問題，所以請你們自行改正。”

Mr. Ji is what is known in China as a professional counterfeit hunter. Part Ralph Nader, part bounty hunter, Mr. Ji rummages for fake or substandard goods in shops. Then, using China’s consumer protection laws, he collects tens of thousands of dollars from the companies that make or sell them. The laws are part of China’s growing effort to weed out the fake clothes, electronics, food and furniture that swamp its stores and frustrate companies and consumers alike.

紀萬昌在中國從事所謂職業(yè)打假的工作，他有點像拉爾夫·納德(Ralph Nader)，也有點像賞金獵人。紀萬昌在商店里搜尋假商品或不合格的商品。然后，他利用中國的消費者保護法，從制造或銷售這些商品的公司那里索取數(shù)萬美元的賠償。消費者保護法是中國不斷努力清除假冒商品的行動的一部分，中國的商店里到處都是假牌子的衣服、電子設(shè)備、食品和家具，讓廠家和消費者很無奈。

But Mr. Ji’s livelihood is now under threat. Some government officials say Mr. Ji and the unknown number of others like him abuse a law that was meant merely to empower consumers to report fakes. If proposed new government rules get accepted, people like Mr. Ji will no longer be able to go pro.

但是現(xiàn)在，紀萬昌的生計受到了威脅。一些政府官員表示，紀萬昌和像他這樣的數(shù)量不詳?shù)穆殬I(yè)打假者在濫用消費者保護法，該法律原來只是為了賦予消費者舉報假貨的權(quán)利。如果政府新起草的規(guī)則得到通過的話，像紀萬昌這樣的人將不再能以打假為職業(yè)。

Even as China grows and matures, and moves to protect brands and ideas, it still struggles with how to get rid of fakes. Overseas governments, overseas companies and even its own increasingly choosy consumers complain that China’s counterfeit products hurt brand names and common people alike. Chinese leaders have stepped up efforts to cull them, in part to protect homegrown companies that are starting to produce their own innovative products. Last year, China’s courts handled about 120,000 intellectual property cases, up 9 percent from 2014, according to official media.

即使中國在發(fā)展成熟，也開始更加注重保護品牌和創(chuàng)意，但在如何擺脫假貨的問題上，情況依然不容樂觀。外國政府、海外公司，甚至日益挑剔的消費者自己也抱怨說，中國的假冒產(chǎn)品損害了品牌和普通人的利益。中國領(lǐng)導(dǎo)人已經(jīng)加大了打假力度，目的之一是保護正在生產(chǎn)自主創(chuàng)新產(chǎn)品的中國公司。去年，據(jù)官方媒體報道，中國法院處理了大約12萬件知識產(chǎn)權(quán)案件，比2014年增長了9%。

One anti-fake effort was intended to empower the consumer. In 2009, the government promised consumers that if they found a product that flouted food safety laws, they could win 10 times the value of that product in compensation. In 2013, China bolstered an earlier consumer protection law by increasing payouts to buyers of other kinds of fake goods, while a decision from China’s supreme court was widely seen as supporting counterfeit hunters.

一些打假活動旨在賦予消費者權(quán)力。2009年，政府向消費者承諾，如果發(fā)現(xiàn)違反食品安全法的產(chǎn)品，他們可以獲得該產(chǎn)品10倍價值的賠償。2013年，中國通過增加對其他類型假貨的買家的賠償力度，強化了之前發(fā)布的消費者保護法，而中國最高法院的一個裁定也被廣泛視為對職業(yè)打假人的支持。

Mr. Ji and his peers have used these laws to their advantage, buying knockoffs in bulk — the more they turn in, the more they are paid — and filling their storerooms withcounterfeit products. Mr. Ji’s group, the Jinan Old Ji Anti-Counterfeit Rights Defense Work Studio, has a network of about 20 informers who report suspected fake products. He says his biggest success to date is collecting about $178,000 in compensation from a company that tried to pass off its blankets as pure cashmere.

紀萬昌和同行們利用這些法律來獲益，他們大量購買仿冒產(chǎn)品——買得越多，獲得的賠償也越多——他們的倉庫里裝滿了假冒產(chǎn)品。紀萬昌的團隊濟南老紀維權(quán)工作室有大約20個線人，向他們匯報疑似假冒產(chǎn)品。他說迄今為止，他最成功的一個案例是從一家公司那里獲得了大約17.8萬美元(約合人民幣120萬元)的賠償，這家公司出售的毯子號稱是純羊絨的。

China’s e-commerce boom has given counterfeit hunters a new front.

中國的電子商務(wù)繁榮給打假者帶來了新的陣地。

“The main purpose of suing them is to ask them to correct themselves,” said Yu Fengsheng, another counterfeit hunter, who chases merchants who sell fakes on online marketplaces run by the Alibaba Group, China’s largest e-commerce company. He became an e-commerce counterfeit hunter after he bought an item marketed by a merchant on Alibaba’s Tmall platform as a foot treatment and discovered that it was probably just makeup. In a statement, Alibaba said it was committed to fighting fakes on its platforms.

另一位職業(yè)打假人于鳳星說，“起訴他們的的目的是要他們整改自己。”喻鳳生在中國最大的電商阿里巴巴集團經(jīng)營的網(wǎng)上集市里尋找銷售假冒商品的賣家。最初他在阿里巴巴的天貓超市購買了一款商家所謂腳部護理產(chǎn)品，結(jié)果發(fā)現(xiàn)它根本是假的，此后他就成為了電商職業(yè)打假人。在一份聲明中，阿里巴巴表示將致力于旗下平臺的打假。

Among overseas companies, people like Mr. Ji have fans. “A lot of my clients would, in some circumstances, support the activities of these kinds of consumer warriors because ultimately they may be uncovering information that helps us do our job,” said Scott Palmer, an intellectual property lawyer at Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton, which represents American corporations in China.

像紀萬昌這樣的人在海外公司里也有粉絲。美國盛智律師事務(wù)所(Sheppard, Mullin, Richter& Hampton)的知識產(chǎn)權(quán)律師彭明(Scott Palmer)說：“在某些情況下，我的很多客戶都會支持這些打假斗士的活動，因為他們最終可能會發(fā)現(xiàn)一些信息，有助于我們做好工作。”

But government officials complain that the program is increasingly expensive and increasingly abused. Even some foreign business groups complain. Counterfeit hunters often profit “from complaints that target minor product labeling errors instead of true quality or safety issues,” said James Zimmerman, chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce in China, in emailed comments.

但政府官員也抱怨說，這個法律程序的成本越來越昂貴，遭到濫用的時候也越來越多。甚至一些外國商業(yè)團體也有怨言。中國美國商會主席吉莫曼(James Zimmerman)通過電郵評論說，職業(yè)打假人通常會“從小產(chǎn)品的標識錯誤，而不是真正的質(zhì)量或安全問題投訴”中獲利。

Proposed government rules released in August and under official consideration said that payouts for fakes would not be available to those who sought them “for commercial purposes.”

政府8月發(fā)布了一個擬議的規(guī)則，目前處于正式考慮階段。規(guī)定說，為了“商業(yè)目的”而購買這些假貨的人不會獲得賠償。

Mr. Ji, defending his work, says he has to recoup his legal fees, which he incurs when the companies he accuses of selling fakes fight back. He says he makes about $148,000 a year but his take-home pay is only about $30,000 to $44,000 after expenses.

紀萬昌辯解說，如果他指控售賣假冒產(chǎn)品的公司進行反擊，就會產(chǎn)生法律費用，他需要收回這些成本。他說自己每年賺大約14.8萬美元，但是支付了這些費用之后，只有大約3萬到4.4萬美元的入賬。

“When they encounter a fake product, more than 80 percent of Chinese people will just suck it up and not take it very seriously, as long as their lives are not in danger,” Mr. Ji said. “If there are more professional counterfeit warriors, the quality of goods will improve at once.”

“80%中國人忍氣吞聲，面對假貨只要不危及生命就不很認真對待，”紀萬昌說。“如果有更多職業(yè)打假人，商品質(zhì)量一下子就提高。”

Mr. Ji never set out to be a consumer rights activist. Born in the northern region of Inner Mongolia, he was so poor he could not afford to enroll in a university. His jobs have included running a carwash, selling clothes on the street and operating a late-night food stall.

紀萬昌一開始并沒有想過要成為消費者權(quán)益活動人士。他出生在內(nèi)蒙古北部，家里很窮，讀不起大學(xué)。他曾經(jīng)開過洗車店，在街頭賣過衣服，還經(jīng)營過夜間食品攤。

In 2000, a friend of his bought a children’s educational compact disc that turned out to contain pornographic content. Furious, he and his friends “laid siege” to the store where they had bought it, demanding compensation, Mr. Ji said. “At that time, I did not understand what defending your rights is,” he said.

2000年，他的朋友買了一張兒童教育光盤，發(fā)現(xiàn)里面有色情內(nèi)容。他和朋友們憤怒地“圍攻”了出售這張光盤的商店，要求賠償，紀萬昌說道。“當時不懂維權(quán)，”他說。

Later, Mr. Ji bought a copy of China’s consumer law and a manual on how to tell fakes from genuine products. From that point, he had a new career.

后來，紀萬昌買了一本中國消費者法律和一本關(guān)于如何辨別真假商品的手冊。從那以后，他開始了新的職業(yè)生涯。

On a recent week in October, Mr. Ji traveled to four courthouses in five days across China, filing lawsuits against shopping malls, accusing them of fraud for selling substandard goods. Based in the eastern city of Jinan, he says he goes to court about 100 times a year.

在今年10月的一周，紀萬昌在五天時間里前往位于不同地方的四家法院起訴了一些商店，指控他們欺詐，銷售不合格商品。他住在中國東部城市濟南，他說每年大約要去100次法院。

Mr. Ji’s work has earned him the enmity of counterfeiters and their thugs, who he says have beaten him up, bound his hands and feet, and telephoned him with death threats. In 2007, police in the southern province of Fujian detained him for 37 days, charging him with extortion, but released him.

紀萬昌的活動引來了造假者及其打手的敵意，他說這些人毆打他，綁住他的手腳，還打電話威脅說要殺了他。2007年，南部省份福建的警方拘留了他37天，指控他敲詐勒索，但后來將其釋放。

Still, Mr. Ji views the work as necessary. Every month, he says, he receives more than a hundred phone calls from people curious about how to get compensation from a fake product.

不過，紀萬昌還是認為這項工作必須有人來做。他說自己每個月都會接到一百多個電話，來電者想知道買到假貨后如何獲得賠償。

On a recent afternoon, a man from the eastern city of Tai’an called Mr. Ji, who was en route to check out a shopping mall in Beijing. How, the caller asked, could he emulate Mr. Ji?

近日一個下午，一個來自東部城市泰安的男子給紀萬昌打電話，當時他正在北京的一個購物中心尋找假貨。那名男子問，要怎樣才能仿效紀萬昌的做法?

Mr. Ji told the aspiring fraud-buster that he could not “just casually enter any shop and buy eight or 10 pieces and demand compensation.” His profession was built on navigating tricky relationships with local courthouses and police, Mr. Ji said, adding that recently some thugs from Tai’an wanted “my life, my arms and my legs.”

紀萬昌對這個想當打假者的男子說，你不能“隨隨便便走進一家商店，買上十件八件假貨，然后要求賠償”。如何處理與當?shù)胤ㄔ汉途降募株P(guān)系是他打假事業(yè)的基礎(chǔ)，紀萬昌說，最近一些來自泰安的暴徒“想要我的命、我的胳膊和腿”。

“Not everyone can be a counterfeit hunter. This industry isn’t a gift that falls down from heaven,” Mr. Ji told the caller. “You haven’t seen the hardships and suffering we’ve gone through. You’ve only seen our glorious side.”

“職業(yè)維權(quán)人，不是說人家要干都能干的。這個行業(yè)不是天上掉餡兒餅，”紀萬昌對那名男子說。“我們辛酸的過程你們沒看到，你們只看到我們輝煌的一面。”