The federal government is contemplating whether to institute additional regulation to prevent counterfeit goods from entering its supply chain.

The specter of counterfeit goods being inadvertently purchased by the government has become a rising concern. In May 2010, a federal court sentenced a convicted counterfeiter to 51 months in prison for having sold fake Cisco equipment to the Defense Department. The purchase of a likely counterfeit networking card by the National Archives and Records Administration in the summer of 2010 helped cause the agency's email system to go partially offline.

Federal officials have also expressed worries that counterfeit goods could cause cybersecurity problems, were they to contain malicious firmware.

In June 2010, the White House called, in a strategic plan (.pdf) on intellectual property enforcement, for an anti-counterfeiting framework to be established by a working group. To that end, the Office of Management and Budget released Aug. 9 a request for public comment on matters the working group will face.

Among them is whether additional administrative actions, "including regulatory actions," are necessary to require suppliers to take stronger anti-counterfeiting measures. OMB asks for companies to describe what methods they've taken to address counterfeit prevention and what they've done after identifying potential counterfeit items.

The working group will also examine methods of product traceability and develop procedures for program managers to identify items at risk for counterfeiting.

For more:
- download the OMB request for comment on counterfeit issues (.pdf)
- download the June 2010 Joint Strategic Plan On Intellectual Property Enforcement (.pdf)

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