There are many ways of sourcing electronic components. Manufacturers recommend that you use their recommended distributors, but that’s not always possible, especially for small quantities and obsolete components.
If you work in purchasing for an electronics company you may receive a regular supply of spam emails from overseas distributors: most people are wise enough to delete these on sight. Components can be sourced on EBay. Searching eBAY for STM8S005C6T6, a popular microcontroller from STMicroelectronics, returns 20 or more suppliers, mostly in China.

The risk of using an unknow supplier is that there is no traceability, to show how they obtained the components. The components could be pre-used, recovered from redundant equipment. They may be incorrectly labelled. They might be stock that was rejected by the manufacturer after testing, and they may be counterfeit. The supplier is not necessarily to blame, as they may have been deceived by their supplier, but it’s still the end user who takes all the risk.

Buying from Auckland takes out the risk. They have thirty years of experience of the component market, and a worldwide network of trusted supplier. They are members of ERAI, and offer component testing. For component sourcing from without the risks, use Auckland.