Fake 1948 Canada Silver Dollar From Ebay Seller Dam283

Undoubtedly but in the charge to address and resolve this issue, there is no drive from those who can actually have an impact. @john100 is right. The value to the Canadian government for a counterfeit 1948 dollar is $1... Just go try to cash one (a legit one) at a bank, a bullion dealer may give you $8-10 for the silver content. A collector will see values ranging to 5 digits depending on grade so the fraud is in the area between cash value, intrinsic value and perceived hobby value. Quite frankly the RCM/RCMP are not going to invest in addressing type of fraud. I haven't heard of many prosecutions on counterfeit currency in Canada. The RCM changed the dies for the $1 and $2 in 2012 for counterfeit prevention so they are aware of the problem but their focus appears to be prevention in current circulation, not the numismatic hobby.

I see (from my perch as a regular consumer reading news reports) more enforcement in capturing counterfeit high value fashion such as Louis Vuitton bags than numismatics. Even with that, I wonder if the hundreds of LV/Chanel/Gucci handbags, all valued at $1,500 and up, that I see on any given day walking through downtown at lunch are legit...

Counterfeiting is a problem that impacts all aspects of commerce. In some cases, the impact is hobbyists such as the current discussion. We are a collection of unconnected individuals with little or no lobby power... who is being hurt here... definitely not an entity with $millions to pressure a government. In other cases, the impact is to businesses... in this case, there is some support from government Louis Vuitton and Nike et al.. all lobby the government and there are seizures at the border for these items but I suspect that the capture rate is quite low.

The other aspect is identification. There is one contributor on this board who maintains a "black" collection to assist his identification of fakes... in a recent thread there were a number who jumped on him for this saying that there are plenty of other sources of confirmation that would not require a personal collection. I disagree and fully understand the need for a "black" collection. The best on-line resources I have seen are for the UK pound coin... a problem that grew to the point where the old coin was demonitized when a completely new coin was introduced but again, the change was driven by the government... there is little enforcement for the plethora of fake 50p Kew Gardens coins.

While I generally agree with @nickelsguy I challenge the comment


Policies mean nothing if not enforced. For the amount of money that ebay make on coin sales, they could easily invest in a few enforcement activities. i.e. a known counterfeit peddler should have future sales subject to verification... even if that means a higher sellers premium for that seller... Machine recognition of known fake dies can be applied to coins to route them to a secondary verification method where knowledgeable folks can validate their authenticity. Enforcement of the "Picture what is for sale" policy... too many ebay listings have a representative picture; this practice is actually against ebay policy but rarely policed and enforced. ebay is little more than an online flea market or car boot sale and I have left this community for that reason.