Alibaba Group, the largest Chinese e-commerce platform, is back on the US's "notorious markets" list for selling high levels of counterfeit goods.
The allegations did not sit well with the company, which insists the claims are false and that the site is more effective than it was four years ago when it was removed from the same list.
Alibaba's Taobao online trade platform is accused of selling large volume of counterfeit and pirated goods and the challenges faced by the rights holders to remove and prevent such goods from selling online.
Alibaba's Good Faith Program, which was started to clean up the platform, remains out of reach for rights holders, the USTR (US Trade Representative) report said.
But the report's claims stand in conflict with Alibaba's points of view on being included in the "notorious markets" list.
"In 2016 alone, we proactively removed more than double the number of infringing product listings than in 2015. It is therefore unreasonable for the USTR to have concluded that Alibaba is less effective in anti-counterfeiting than when it reviewed our efforts in 2015 and when it removed us from its list four years ago," wrote Alibaba Group President, Michael Evans in a letter published on the company website.
Evans also questioned whether USTR's decision is based on the "actual facts or was influenced by the current political climate". It is not a secret that US President-elect Donald Trump has slammed China for "stealing intellectual property" during his presidential campaign.
"We are very proud of our highly robust anti-counterfeiting programs and believe we have dedicated far more personnel, financial resources and advanced technologies toward protecting intellectual property than any other e-commerce company," Evans wrote.
Despite this, the company is determined to protect the intellectual property of right holders to fight counterfeiting both online and offline.
