Fraudsters finding new ways to fake wine

Three recent wine fraud cases in the UK and Italy reveal just how many ways criminals can exploit the value attached to wine, from imaginary bottles and convincing counterfeits to entirely false claims about where a wine was made.

Wine fraud is often associated with fake bottles, but the latest cases show that the deception can happen much earlier in the supply chain.

In the UK, wine executive Stephen Burton has been sentenced to six years in prison for his role in a $99 million investment fraud. Investors were told their money was being used to finance loans secured against collections of rare wine. The supposed collateral included more than 25,000 bottles, featuring prestigious names such as Domaine de la Romanée-Conti and Château Lafleur. In reality, prosecutors said Bordeaux Cellars held just 217 bottles.

Another UK case involved a more traditional form of fraud. A 34-year-old man was arrested after 55 bottles of suspected counterfeit wine were allegedly sold to a victim for more than £500,000. At an average of over £9,000 a bottle, convincing labels and packaging could generate enormous profits.

In Italy, meanwhile, authorities seized 2.5 million litres of wine falsely certified as DOP or IGP, worth more than €4 million. Here, it was the wine's claimed identity and provenance that were allegedly falsified.