Download this report as an MP3 sound file.


For broadcast on CBS Radio Network stations October 25-26, 2003:

Fakes, Frauds and Forgeries

The Stamp Collecting Report, I'm Lloyd de Vries.

The online auction site eBay is banning the sale of counterfeit stamps UNLESS they're 
permanently marked as such, and the description SAYS that's what they are.

The new policy was developed with the help of the American Philatelic Society, the 
nation's largest stamp collecting organization.

For example, right now, you can buy on eBay an "exact replica" of the Inverted Jenny 
stamp, worth about 200-thousand dollars, for five bucks. The seller SAYS it's a 
reproduction -- but down the road, how will someone KNOW if it's a fake? 

The problem is....some people COLLECT forged stamps. In fact, many Postal Counterfeits -- 
forgeries intended to defraud a government -- are worth many times more than the stamps 
they imitate. And those collectors DON'T want their material defaced by being marked as 
fakes. They say only a fool would sell one of these valuable counterfeits for the price 
of the real thing.

As they say in radio, stay tuned.

And that's stamp collecting this week. 

I'm Lloyd de Vries, CBS News. 

----------------------------------------------------------
Go to Previous Report
Go to Next Report 

Go to Report Index