Need action to curb spread of ‘fake’ cellphones, accessories in market

This news has been read 8250 times!

Exploded fake cellphone batteries.
Exploded fake cellphone batteries.

KUWAIT CITY, July 16: The chances of counterfeit mobile phones, their parts and accessories causing calamitous damage to its users have become high. Who is responsible for the widespread counterfeit devices in Kuwait? In a recent review, several citizens, expatriates, owners of mobile phone shops and telecom engineers, unanimously agreed on the need to intensify inspection and surveillance of the market to prevent the spread of all types of counterfeit devices and their accessories due to the dangers they constitute to life.

A citizen Saadoun Abdulwahab said the Kuwaiti mobile phone market is flooded with counterfeit products, especially chargers and batteries manufactured using primitive methods and cheap raw materials that may cause an explosion at any second. Nasser Al-Bader pointed out that Customs Department is the first and last authority responsible for the spread of such items.

He lamented the ministry’s lack of inspection of the markets and called for awareness campaigns to warn of the dangers of counterfeit products on the health of people. Supervisor at a mobile phone shop, Saed Farouq said the parts and accessories of mobile phones are known as “commercial products” because most of the mobile phone shops in Kuwait would have been shut down by now if they were not there, indicating the shops derive more profits from the sale of accessories and parts compared to mobile phones; besides most consumers prefer to buy headsets worth 500 fils to avoid original ones that go for KD 3, whereas counterfeit chargers are sold for KD 1 compared to the original price of KD 3.5.

He noted original products are far better than the counterfeits having many defects. For his part, Engineer Jamal Marouf said the explosion of mobile phone batteries arise out of several factors such as charging them through computer connection that increases the temperature of battery, because the frequency of the USB port on PC differs with the frequency of electric charger.

By Najeh Bilal Al Seyassah Staff

This news has been read 8250 times!

Related Articles

Back to top button

Advt Blocker Detected

Kindly disable the Ad blocker

Verified by MonsterInsights