Excellent expose, Slash! I have seen a few of these (only online) in the past. The thing I notice immediately as a tell-tale giveaway is the shape of the frog stud "foot". If this repro 'bard finds a market, I have no doubt "cof 44" will only be the first of many other codes & dates to follow. However, the threat is really to the novice collector. Unfortunately, with (often intentionally) mediocre or poor photographs of such items online, even some advancing collectors could get suckered.
While on the subject of photographs, I recall some years back getting a notification from Ebay that my photos (taken with a Sony Mavica FD73 which I still use to this day) were sub-standard due to the pixel count. They were setting a new standard because smart phone users could not get enough detail when viewing the merch on their itty-bitty screens. Fast forward to today, and you find some of the biggest offenders providing poor photographs are those same people! If you were active online in the 1980s, you might recall digital cameras were not a cheap proposition. So, some sellers resorted to using a scanner instead to post images to their listings and they were beyond bad...!