Shoppers on Ebay in the US yesterday could pick from more than 2,500 supposedly genuine Louis Vuitton handbags. The company's French site, by contrast, listed just 80.

That is the sort of discrepancy that, according to critics, highlights a glaring truth about the world's biggest e-commerce company: that, in spite of Ebay's claims to have cracked down, in some markets the sale of large numbers of counterfeit luxury goods continues unabated.