US trade office says monitoring Alibaba e-commerce site

An advertisement for online shopping site Taobao.com of Alibaba Group is seen at a metro station in Shanghai, Nov 12, 2014. [Photo/IC]

The US trade office said on Thursday it is keeping an eye on Alibaba Group Holding Ltd's consumer shopping website for sales of counterfeit and pirated goods, but refrained from putting the site back on a piracy blacklist.

USTR named 25 online marketplaces and 19 physical markets in a report. It decided against reinstating Alibaba's consumer-to-consumer shopping website Taobao.com, which was removed in 2012, and said it would continue to monitor the site.

An Alibaba spokeswoman said the company was dedicated to the fight against counterfeits. "We work closely with our government partners, brands and industry associations to tackle this issue at its source," she said.

Alibaba says it spent more than 1 billion yuan ($160.7 million) combating fake goods and improving customer protection from the beginning of 2013 to the end of November.