What Are Types of Counterfeit Electronic Components?
Components are the core components of circuit boards, but nowadays counterfeit electronic components are flooding the market. ICHOME as a professional distributor, we need to have the ability to distinguish, so how do we distinguish whether the components we buy are counterfeit or not? Counterfeit components are usually recycled components, cloned (imitation), overproduced and out of specification, defective components, and components with tampered description information, which can create serious hidden dangers, and the tampered information in the chip may destroy the function of the whole system.
Recycled Components
Recycled components refer to those components that are discarded and scrapped after a period of manufacture and use in equipment. After being centrally collected and sold to buyers, discarded electronics are disassembled into bare circuit boards, components are extracted through a crude process, and then sorted, cleaned, labeled and re-taped. A majority of counterfeit components fall into this type. Components are usually severely damaged due to use, aging and recycling processes.
Imitation Components and Cloned Components
Counterfeit components and clone components are components that are made by a copycat manufacturer rather than the original manufacturer. They may be reverse engineered components using pirated technology or intellectual property. Unauthorized manufacturers attempt to copy the original design, process, and materials to obtain the same level of functionality as the original design. However, in most cases, imitation components are inferior to the original in every way because the imitation manufacturer takes no responsibility for the quality or performance of its product and does not realize improvements through market feedback. In some cases, copycat components are manufactured under license from the OCM, but they are marked and labeled accordingly, and copycat or clone components are different from the original component both internally and externally because they are produced and packaged in different manufacturing facilities.
Overproduced Components
Overproduced components are illegally manufactured by OCM's contract foundries. In some cases, OCMs use a contract manufacturing plant production model by designing IP and masks for their components, where the manufacturing plant has knowledge of the manufacturing process and owns all the production masks. OEMs may overproduce components by fabricating yield data and then sell the excess chips to the marketplace
Substandard Components
Substandard, defective components come from unscrupulous vendors who will sell defective parts that are likely to pass initial screening because defects are unlikely to show up in the first few hours or months of a chip's normal operation, but they will eventually fail.
Overproduced and out-of-specification, defective components look the same from the inside because they may have been manufactured in the same factory using the same processes and materials. However, they may look slightly different from the original components.
Expired components are old components sold as new. They may have been manufactured by an OCM, but their tracking information and labeling are fraudulent. Components usually have a “shelf life” of 18-36 months after production. After that time, their solder leads may develop an oxidized layer and their metal structure may change due to intermetallic compound reactions in the lead alloy.
Internally, an obsolete component may look almost identical to a new one. However, a closer look at the pins on the outside of an obsolete component may reveal the difference.
As a component distributor with many years of industry experience, ICHOME has established a perfect quality control system. We always adhere to the principle of “customer first” to provide customers with reliable quality assurance.
