Vinyl revival drives rise in fake LPs; UK police seize £260,000 of counterfeit records in one city alone

Photo by Bruno Martins on Unsplash

A raid by the City Of London Police’s Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit (PIPCU) and the British Phonographic Industry’s (BPI) Content Protection Unit saw the seizure of nearly 6,500 counterfeit vinyl records with an estimated street value of £259, 920.

The raid, in Luton, Bedfordshire, sends “a clear message that the sale of counterfeit goods will not be tolerated and highlights the impact that strong partnership working can have in tackling intellectual property crime,” says Jamie Kirk, a Detective Sergeant at PIPCU. “Counterfeit vinyl harms legitimate businesses and causes real losses for artists and the wider music industry.”

Peter Ratcliffe, Director of Content Protection at the BPI (which BPI represents UK record labels) said:

“The vinyl revival means that there are sadly criminals trying to take advantage and cash in through counterfeiting. Like all illegal markets, this doesn’t just damage our UK music industry, it potentially impacts every one of us as citizens, as these ill-gotten gains often fund other forms of criminal activity.”

PIPCU is a specialist police team dedicated to protecting physical goods from intellectual property crime and combatting online piracy. It was established in 2013 with funding from the UK’s Intellectual Property Office (IPO). The IPO confirmed last month that funding for PIPCU, from the IPO and the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT), was being renewed for another three years, from April 2026.

PIPCU's remit is to investigate, disrupt and prevent intellectual property crime that causes significant harm to the UK economy and the general public.

Since it was set up, PIPCU has investigated intellectual property crime worth more than £100 million concerning counterfeit goods or digital piracy, and suspended more than 30,000 websites selling counterfeit goods. These websites have also been linked to identity theft.

Vinyl records were the main way for consumers to buy physical music up until the 1980s, when sales began to be hit by cassette tapes and then Compact Discs (CDs). However, in the mid-2000s, a vinyl revival started to gather pace. In the UK, in 2023, the BPI reported that vinyl purchases have increased for a 16th consecutive year in the UK, with a sales increase in 2023 over the previous year of 11.7%.

Interestingly, 2023 was also the year that sales of cassette tapes hit their highest level since 2003, as The Guardian reported. The rebound of the cassette tape as a format to consume music, like the revival of vinyl, has been attributed to a younger generation’s interest in retro chic ‘pre-digital’ technologies from the 1980s and 1990s.