"In the Midst of This, Made in China?"... Gyeonggi-do Cracks Down on 17 Places Selling Fake Masks

[Asia Economy (Suwon) = Reporter Lee Young-gyu] Gyeonggi Province has uncovered a large number of companies that exploited residents' anxiety about COVID-19 by selling low-priced Chinese masks as health masks at inflated prices or advertising masks without infection-blocking effects as if they had such effects.

The Gyeonggi Province Special Judicial Police announced on the 13th that they conducted an investigation on 29 online shopping mall companies from the 31st of last month to the 12th of this month and found violations of the Pharmaceutical Affairs Act in 17 companies.

Company A, located in Gyeonggi Province, imported uncertified Chinese masks at 3,740 KRW each and sold them as COVID-19 prevention masks for 9,300 KRW each, making a 2.5 times profit, and was caught in the investigation.

Also, Company B in Gyeonggi Province purchased Chinese masks without KF (Korea Filter) certification at 1,100 KRW each and sold them at 1,750 KRW each in January. However, as COVID-19 spread in February, they sold them at 2,500 KRW each while advertising them as equivalent to KF94 certification, which led to their detection.

Company C in Gyeonggi Province exaggerated the infection-blocking efficacy of KF80 grade masks, which only block fine dust but do not block infection sources, by advertising them as if they were KF94 or KF99 grade masks with infection-blocking effects, and sold about 40,000 masks before being caught.

Company D in Seoul sold similar products at 16,900 KRW, which is 5.3 times higher than other companies selling at 3,180 KRW, and was found to have falsely advertised masks without KF certification as having a fine dust blocking rate of over 80%.

Among the 17 companies caught in this investigation, the special judicial police criminally charged 13 companies located in the metropolitan area and transferred 4 companies outside the metropolitan area to the relevant special judicial police jurisdictions.

Furthermore, in accordance with the "Notice on Prohibition of Hoarding of Health Masks and Hand Sanitizers" announced by the Minister of Strategy and Finance on the 5th, administrative investigations into hoarding by health mask sales and distribution companies were also conducted simultaneously to resolve the unstable supply of health masks early and minimize damage to residents through multifaceted efforts.

Inchi Kwon, head of the Gyeonggi Province Special Judicial Police, stated, "Despite prior announcements of focused investigations on substandard health masks, mask sellers trying to gain unfair profits by taking advantage of the national disaster-level COVID-19 outbreak were caught," and added, "We will continue to investigate the manufacturing and sales of substandard health masks until the COVID-19 outbreak is over."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.