.jpg "What to Pack for a Road Trip, According to a Vogue Editor")
HYBE, BIGHIT Music, and HYBE America have filed a lawsuit in New Jersey federal court seeking to stop the sale of counterfeit BTS merchandise around the group’s shows at MetLife Stadium next month.
The complaint, which you can read in full here, was filed on Friday (July 10) in the US District Court for the District of New Jersey, ahead of BTS’s two concerts in East Rutherford on August 1 and 2.
Filed by law firm Loeb & Loeb, the suit names John Does 1-100, Jane Does 1-100, and XYZ Companies 1-100 as defendants, described in the filing as bootleggers whose identities are not yet known.
Rather than targeting named sellers, the suit seeks a court order authorizing HYBE and law enforcement to seize counterfeit goods from whoever sells them in the vicinity of the venue.
The plaintiffs are asking the court to authorize agents and police to “seize and impound any and all Bootleg Merchandise which the Defendants attempt to sell, distribute or hold for sale at, within, or in the vicinity of the East Rutherford Shows and the other U.S. concert performances on the current Tour, before, during and after said concerts.”
The complaint says it “will be amended when their true names and capacities are ascertained”, referring to the unidentified defendants.
“The Bootleg Merchandise is generally of inferior quality.”
HYBE legal filing
It is not the first such filing tied to the BTS WORLD TOUR ARIRANG.
In April, the company filed a near-identical complaint in Florida federal court ahead of the tour’s opening shows in Tampa, as previously reported by MBW.
HYBE also notes in the New Jersey filing that it obtained identical relief in 2019 and 2021, including the seizure of counterfeit merchandise at MetLife Stadium in May 2019.
The filing is one of several recent anti-counterfeiting actions across the music industry.
In June, Universal Music Group‘s merchandise arm Bravado obtained a court order to seize counterfeit merchandise from bootleggers at A$AP Rocky‘s Don’t Be Dumb World Tour.
HYBE’s latest complaint brings four causes of action: violation of the Lanham Act, unfair competition, violation of the right of publicity under New Jersey common law, and violation of the New Jersey Unfair Competition Act.
It says the counterfeit goods are “of the same general appearance” as the official Tour Merchandise and “likely to cause confusion among prospective purchasers.”
“The Bootleg Merchandise is generally of inferior quality,” HYBE says in the filing.
“The sale of such merchandise is likely to injure the reputation of BTS and Plaintiffs, which have developed the reputation for high quality associated with the Tour Merchandise by virtue of BTS’s public performances and Plaintiffs’ sale of officially licensed BTS merchandise in connection with such performances.”
The filing adds that the sales also injure BTS and the plaintiffs “in that Defendants do not have to pay any royalty for these unlawful sales.”
According to the complaint, HYBE has licensed the official tour merchandise rights to HYBE America, which has an agreement with Amazon.com Services, LLC to sell official merchandise.
In its 2025 sustainability report, HYBE said it also works with Amazon to remove counterfeit listings, reporting 92,208 such removals over four months last year.
It said it confiscated 19,356 counterfeit items in physical crackdowns during 2025, including from vendors around a j-hope solo concert venue.
The US leg of the tour runs across 10 cities between April and September, with the MetLife Stadium dates followed by stops in Foxborough, Baltimore, Arlington, Chicago, and Los Angeles.
BTS’s comeback album Arirang, released on March 20, debuted at No.1 on the Billboard 200 and drew more than 110 million streams on Spotify in its first 24 hours.
The release helped drive HYBE to record first-quarter revenue of $477 million, up 39.5% year-over-year.
Separately, HYBE is among the defendants in a copyright lawsuit filed on July 8 by three songwriters who allege the Arirang single SWIM copied their demo, the third US copyright complaint against the company in two months.Music Business Worldwide
