counterfeiting operations are forcing shops to close because of lost business.

Trading standards bosses across the region are reporting huge rises in black market copies of music CDs and films on DVD.

Investigators have uncovered mini factories in houses and above shops which are capable of churning out thousands of discs a day.

This week, consumer watchdogs warned the bootleggers they will be caught and potential customers not to buy the cut-price imitations.

Middlesbrough Council trading standards manager, John Wells, said the copies - available for between 50p and £5 - are usually of poor quality, and their widespread distribution is costing legitimate businesses thousands of pounds.

In the past five months, two counterfeiters in Middlesbrough have had their copying equipment confiscated and given community punishment orders by the courts.

A raid on a house on the town's Park End estate uncovered a film library of almost 2,000 DVD discs and more than 5,000 MP3 music files as well as a number of computers and copying machines - even in the kitchen.

When a shop in Cumberland Road was raided, 3,000 discs of copied music, film and computer games were found, along with hundreds of printed inlay covers and lists of handwritten orders.

Mr Wells said: "This is a huge problem for the business community and in the last year complaints of counterfeit sales have exceeded the traditional concern among traders of sales of tobacco, cigarettes and solvents to under-age people.

"Shops in the town are suffering badly and just after Christmas one of the record stores just shut down.

"People say things cost too much and if they were cheaper they would not buy the copies, but this is breaking the law. In effect, it's buying stolen goods.

"There is also the quality aspect because sometimes they have subtitles on and many are unwatchable.

North Yorkshire County Council's head of trading standards and regulatory services Stuart Pudney said: "This is a problem all year round but particularly at this time of year when there is perhaps a greater market for presents."

Michael Welsh, Hartlepool Borough Council's principal trading standards officer, said: "It is a serious threat in the future to any small retailer who supplies DVDs, videos, music and computer games.

"We have had that in Hartlepool in the past when a computer games shop closed down because of the problems with counterfeiting."