Most counterfeits cost money. Counterfeit baby formula can cost health, and it is the category regulators treat most seriously for good reason. Infants live entirely on formula when it is their food, so dilution, wrong composition, contamination, or expired stock relabelled as fresh does harm no adult product comparison can match.
Fake and diverted formula surfaces after recalls, thefts, and return fraud, as well as through deliberate counterfeiting. This guide explains how risky stock enters the market, why the packaging cannot reassure you, and the short list of buying rules that actually protect a baby.
Counterfeit sunscreen may contain little or none of the rated UV filters, so the SPF number is meaningless. Buy from authorised sellers, check batch codes where offered, and treat a familiar premium brand at an implausible price as a warning, not a bargain.
You cannot see UV protection, which is why fake sunglasses are a health risk dressed as a fashion bargain. Genuine pairs carry standard markings, model codes matching the case and paperwork, and lenses an optician can test in seconds. A logo perfect fake can still offer no real protection.
Dark lenses without UV filtering are worse than no sunglasses at all: the tint relaxes the eye's natural squint and the pupil opens wider, letting more ultraviolet in than it would facing the light unaided. That is the quiet problem inside a good looking fake, where the darkness is cosmetic and the protection claimed on the sticker was never measured by anyone.
Counterfeiters invest where buyers look: logos, hinges, case, and cloth. The lens, the one part doing medical work, gets the cheapest tinted plastic available. Price and polish therefore tell you almost nothing, and a confident seller with beautiful packaging can be selling eye protection that protects nothing but his margin.
Start with consistency. The model code on the arm should match the case, the paperwork, and the manufacturer's listing for that frame, including lens description and size. Markings for the applicable UV standard should be present and correctly stated, hinges should move smoothly without looseness, and the frame should sit level with lenses free of distortion when you look across a straight line and move the glasses slowly.
Then use the free laboratory on every high street: most opticians will test UV transmission quickly, often at no charge, because they would rather you wore safe lenses. A pair that fails goes back to the seller with the test result noted, which also strengthens any payment dispute far beyond saying they felt cheap.
If the appeal is the style rather than the badge, honest budget brands sell certified UV protection at low prices, because UV filtering is not expensive when a maker actually does it. That route gives you the look, tested lenses, and a receipt, which is everything the fake promised except the logo it had no right to use.
Vintage and second hand designer pairs sit in between: the frames may be genuine but old lenses can be scratched, swapped, or degraded. An optician's test settles it before a holiday does. Whatever the source, the rule is the same: trust the measurement, not the marking, when the product's whole job is invisible.
Keep reading: Who we protect covers a nearby case in this series.
Not reliably. Tricks with banknotes and torches test fluorescence, not the UV transmission of a lens. An optician's meter gives a real answer in seconds and is the only home priced route worth trusting for a product worn to protect your eyes.
No. Tint and UV filtering are separate properties. A certified clear lens can block nearly all UV while a very dark counterfeit lens blocks little, and the dark fake can increase exposure by letting your pupil open wider behind it.
Look for the UV standard or category marking used in your market, a model and size code consistent across frame, case, and paperwork, and manufacturer details that match official listings. Missing, misspelled, or mismatched codes are strong counterfeit signals.
No. Polarisation is a separate feature that fakes also claim and sometimes include. It says nothing about UV protection or authenticity. Check model consistency and get the UV test rather than treating any single feature as proof.