Illegal weapons are being flogged by third-party sellers on a stream of popular online marketplaces, according to a new consumer watchdog investigation.
A probe by Which? found the dangerous items being sold on AliExpress, Amazon Marketplace, eBay and Wish.
It says its discovery demonstrates why major tech firms need to take more responsibility and carry out better checks on banned weapons which are being sold at “pocket-money” prices as low as 49p.
The findings were greeted with horror by police chiefs and trading standards officers amid an epidemic of knife crime across the UK which has left a soaring number of teenagers dead.
The consumer champion carried out simple searches for banned offensive weapons on popular online marketplaces, including zombie and flick knives, knuckle dusters, swords and batons.
It says it was easily able to find one or more of these potentially lethal items on the respective platforms.
Which? says the law, including the Offensive Weapons Act 2019, makes clear that none of these weapons should be available for sale in the UK - and they cannot even be owned in a private home.
If a person were to be caught with one of these products, they could face arrest and a prison sentence.
It comes after a Mirror probe last month found children can buy cheap killer knives in high street stores with shocking ease.
Our 16-year-old undercover shopper Martha was illegally sold big blades in 15 UK outlets, some for the price of a soft drink.
In Which? 's investigation, on its Amazon search, it found more than a dozen listings for friction lock batons masquerading as ‘trekking poles.’
Friction lock batons are a banned offensive weapon. It is illegal to buy and to sell them in the UK.
Some of the listings Which? found used special characters, such as ‘b’t ?’, in the title or only used the word baton in the artwork - presumably to avoid detection by Amazon.
Some of the images on the listings indicated that they could be used for self-defence and fighting.
On eBay, Which?’s experts found a variety of illegal swords, zombie knives, and knuckle dusters, including a 23-inch steel serrated-edged zombie knife costing £27 and a 27-inch zombie blade with a red fire design for £32.
One seller was offering a combo deal on a karambit blade and a ‘paralysing spray’ for £13.99.
According to eBay’s terms and conditions, none of these weapons should be for sale.
Which? found the widest selection of weapons for sale on AliExpress and Wish - with simple searches of the terms ‘flick knife’, ‘automatic opening knife’ and ‘spring assisted knives’ returning dozens of results on each, many priced at less than £10 and some even marketed for self-defence.
When it came to Wish, Which? was able to find a large number of flick knives and at least a dozen butterfly knives - blades that open out into a point - even though they are illegal.
Researchers also found several belt buckle knives priced from £8, a selection of knuckle dusters and a number of concealed blades - including a £1 knife designed to be hidden inside a wallet.
Other items included friction lock batons, one of which was disguised within an umbrella and another which was marketed for use in self-defence and had in excess of 30 UK reviews.
On AliExpress, Which? found a large number of flick knives, hidden blades, and a raft of ‘self-defence rings’ designed to be worn as knuckle dusters - one priced at just 49p.
AliExpress also targeted Which? with promotional emails for cut price blades after Which? searched on the site - including a variety of curved karambit knives, with one priced at just £1.79.
Which?’s understanding is that karambits are not illegal to own but are illegal to carry in public.
Researchers were also sent an email promotion for a knife with a skull design on the blade, priced at £9.63.
On all four platforms, additional banned weapons were recommended by their algorithms after Which?’s initial searches for weapons.
Amazon and eBay said they had removed all the listings reported to them by Which?.
Wish said it is in the process of removing the reported listings.
Amazon said it would take “appropriate enforcement” against the baton sellers, eBay said it was investigating why the items were not blocked to UK buyers and Wish said it was “exploring remedial action against any offending merchants.”
AliExpress said it had removed the listings but Which? received two further promotional emails from AliExpress since its initial response - one offering a ‘self defence’ flick knife for £2.83.
Which? believes its investigation shows online marketplaces must take more responsibility and carry out better checks and monitoring on dangerous items.
Sue Davies, Which? Head of Consumer Protection Policy, said: “It is disturbing that our latest investigation has uncovered illegal weapons being sold on online marketplaces at extraordinarily cheap prices and that these tech firms are also pushing additional dangerous items to people.
“This raises big question marks over the checks and monitoring being done by these platforms.
“It’s clear that online marketplaces need to take more responsibility and prevent illegal weapons appearing on their sites.”
Caroline Liggins, Head of Youth Team at law firm Hodge Jones & Allen, told Which?: “I was shocked, I thought they were going to be expensive and they were about £9.
“We were shocked by how easy it is to buy them. It’s pocket money, isn’t it?
“When we looked there were no signs warning about how old you have to be to buy these products and no warnings about what is lawful or unlawful.”
Richard Carr, a former senior Merseyside police detective turned lecturer in policing at Liverpool John Moores University, said the sale of such weapons can have real world consequences.
He said: “I’m surprised from a moral perspective that websites are selling these types of products. When weapons of this nature get into the hands of people who have criminal intent, then that outcome can be catastrophic.”
AliExpress said: "The safety of our customers is our highest priority. We have strict guidelines for merchants regarding the sale of knives. In addition to this, customers must verify that they are over the age of 18 in order to be able to purchase knives on our platform.
"We have removed the items highlighted by Which?'s investigation and are reviewing the accounts of any third-party merchants who might have breached our platform rules. We thank Which? for bringing to our attention the category of 'self-defence' rings. We are investigating this and will continue to keep an eye on it. We regularly assess our practices to improve them."
An Amazon spokesperson said: "We require all products to comply with applicable laws and have developed industry-leading tools to prevent non-compliant products from being listed in our stores. We are disappointed when bad actors evade our systems and we will use these learnings to improve our prevention mechanisms.
"These products have now been removed from the store and we are taking appropriate enforcement against the bad actors in question. These are isolated incidents that do not reflect the fantastic products and customer experience provided by millions of small businesses selling in our store."
eBay added: "eBay UK prohibits the sale of the vast majority of knives, with the exception of letter openers, certain tools and dining cutlery. Sellers must comply with our policies as well as any applicable laws and regulations when selling knives. As an international marketplace our policies vary across the world and some of the listings highlighted by Which? are permitted under US policy and sold by US registered sellers. UK buyers are blocked from purchasing these knives. We are investigating why this block did not take place in this instance.
"eBay takes the safety of its customers very seriously. We enforce our Product Safety Policy using block filter algorithms that aim to prevent unsafe products being listed on site in the first place and the eBay Security Team perform additional checks to identify listings that do not comply with our policies and takes enforcement action against sellers. This could include removing listings, selling restrictions or account suspensions."
A spokesperson for Wish said: "We condemn the listing or sale of illegal weapons on our UK platform - not only do such listings violate our Merchant Terms of Service, they fundamentally breach our moral code.
"While we have a number of systems and methods in place to prevent the appearance of illegal weapons, it appears, on this occasion, our merchants have identified a way to circumvent our processes. We are working to remove the listings highlighted by Which? and are carrying out an urgent review of our processes, while exploring remedial action against any offending merchants."
