E-commerce billionaire Jack Ma wants Chinese policy makers to make tough laws to crackdown on counterfeit goods as Alibaba struggles to keep millions of fake goods off its shopping websites.

In an open letter written to Chinese delegates on the sidelines of China's annual parliament session, Ma lamented that "the majority of counterfeiters are not held legally responsible for their actions."

Like Us on Facebook

"If the penalty for even one fake product manufactured or sold was a seven-day prison sentence, the world would look very different both in terms of intellectual property enforcement and food and drug safety," Ma added.

This is probably the first time that the 52 years old Chinese billionaire has directly appealed to the Chinese government to shore up support for his company's efforts against the counterfeit goods. Ma's desperation is understandable given that millions of fake goods listed on his e-commerce platforms like Taobao and Tmall. This continues to mar Alibaba's reputation.

Alibaba got a grim reminder of its struggle against fake goods when last year its website Taobao was blacklisted on the infamous list of U.S. counterfeit goods. The site reappeared on the infamous list after a gap of nearly four years, bringing a lot of shame and criticism to the e-commerce giant.

Alibaba responded quickly to the blacklisting fiasco by forming what it called the world's first "Big Data Anti-Counterfeiting Alliance," which includes several big brands like Samsung, Louis Vuitton, and Huawei.

Jessie Zheng, Alibaba Group chief platform governance officer, claims that harnessing the power of big data is necessary since today it is the powerful weapon available against the counterfeit goods.

How much this big data experiment will yield results is yet to be seen? But detecting counterfeit goods among millions of goods listed on its shopping website is going to be challenging for Alibaba.

TagsJack Ma, china, counterfeit goods, counterfeiters, Alibaba Counterfiet Goods