There is a similar bump opposite this on the bottom of the card. There is a slight white protrusion about a third of the way from the side edge. Hold the card as you would in your hand and look at the top edge. The colors on the front often appear washed out when compared to a real card as well.Īdditionally, the latest batch of fakes we uncovered has a distinguishing mark on the edges of the card. The most noticeable is the color in the word Magic on the back of the card. While different expansions of Magic cards over the years have occasionally had slight color variations, the counterfeits are often so far off you can't miss spotting it. For starters, the colors are noticeably inaccurate when compared to real Magic cards. A real pack of cards will barely bend, while one of the counterfeit packs will bend quite noticeably with little effort.Īnd finally, most counterfeits are easily distinguishable as fakes without going into anything complicated.
Hold the pack by the ends in your hand and apply gentle pressure to the ends of the pack in a slight arch.
On the copy product they are generally horizontal and far fewer in number.Īdditionally, the paper used in these products is usually much more flexible than paper used in standard Magic product. On real product the heat seal striations are vertical. The pack seals have distinguishing marks. You will still be able to spot the fakes. To our knowledge to date, no counterfeit product has reproduced these security markings, and the recent counterfeit boxes have only standard plastic wrap without the symbols. All Wizards of the Coast product is packed out with plastic overwrap that contains white Wizards logo symbols printed on the plastic. In fact, you can spot the counterfeits at every level you might see the product at. Luckily though, these are fairly low quality and are fairly easy to spot.
While we make every effort to assist in shutting down these operations, not everyone in the world respects copyrights and trademarks to the degree that they are enforced in the U.S., and some areas are more difficult to trace and shut down. A number of these have appeared on popular online sites and some have migrated over through solicitations to legitimate retail operations by some rather unscrupulous individuals. A recent operation in Southeast Asia has been producing and distributing boxes of counterfeit Magic cards. Because despite our efforts, illegal counterfeit boxes of Magic as well as counterfeit single cards are being produced and distributed, and you might be the next victim of these criminals. Curiously though, our lawyers seem to define imitation as a violation of several federal and international trademark and copyright laws punishable by fines and/or imprisonment, and they requested that I write some information up to help the unsuspecting honest retailers and customers ferret out the truth from the lies. They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.