Knockoff Artists Financing Terrorism

When you carry a fake Gucci handbag, you're carrying it for bin Laden.

That's the alarm being sounded by a string of law enforcement agencies and industry associations who say the sale of counterfeit products is a lucrative and largely untraceable money source for al-Qaeda, Hizballah, and other global terrorists.

Now lawmakers talk of connections between DVD pirates in Los Angeles and Lebanese terrorist outfits launching attacks in Israel.

In testimony before Congress in 2004, Richard K. Willard, senior vice president and general counsel of the Gillette Company, noted that "seized al-Qaeda training manuals recommend the sale of fake goods as a financing source for its terrorism."