2,000 Fake iPhones Seized

Nicole Martinelli ()

Customs officers in San Francisco confiscated a shipment of 2,000 iPhoneys they estimate to be worth $1.2 million.

The faux iPhones flew in via Taiwan before being ferreted out by customs agents on March 9.

They must have been pretty good fakes it took about a month to verify that they were, in fact, fraudulent.

A video from local ABC station show some pretty heavy-handed knock-offs sans Apple logo on the back.

One of the tip-offs: the almost-iPhones had a sliding back cover to remove the battery while on the real deal, the battery compartment is sealed.

Customs officer Ed Low told newspapers he thought the phones could fetch $600, without a service contract.

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That strikes me as a little overblown: the last fake iPhone a friend of mine bought over eBay cost about $80, (60 euros) though it was a pretty chintzy copy.

Via San Jose Mercury News

8 comments »

About the author

nicole_martinelli

Nicole Martinelli is a San Francisco native who has lived in Milan and Florence, Italy. She's written for Wired.com, The New York Times and Newsweek. You can find her on Twitter , Facebook and Google+.

If you're doing something new/cool that's Apple related, email her about it.

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Posted in iPhone, News |

  • stephen p.

    i saw them on the news last night. they were terrible fakes. no apple logos anywhere on the devices or the boxes. the report just proved to me how inept custom officers are rather than how awesome.

  • yargo

    lol

    The back slides off and it took a month to verify they were fakes?

    My 8 year old daughter would have said, “Look daddy, now the back slides off.”

  • Opala41

    Thousands of iPhone clones are sold thru eBay and websites like DealExtreme and reach the US every day in small, cardboard packages… I played with some, since they are common here in Brazil and God, they are horrible. Nothing compared to the real deal. They cost, in China and HK, about US$ 80 (sometimes with free shipping…)

  • xela

    Kinda funny and sad story. Imagine what smugglers can bring into country if customs need 1 month to figure out fake iPhone with such obvious signs…

  • Howard

    Are you sure they came from Taiwan? and not Shenzhen, China. I am surprised that Taiwan customs will let clones go through nowadays. Taiwan is usually much more respectable of copyright and intellectual properties than China.

  • http://www.zoomata.com Nicole Martinelli

    @howard — the reports say the shipment was from Taiwan but the merchandise was marked “made in China.”

  • Nathan

    Nicole –

    The nation of “Taiwan” officially recognizes itself as the Republic of China (ROC). The mainland Chinese claim themselves as the People’s Republic of China (PRC).

    You see Nicole, they both claim to BE “The One True China”. The split dates all the way back to WWII (and actually even long before that).

  • Nathan

    addendum:

    While “made in Taiwan” is often seen in product labels, it is not unheard of to see an occasional product which the Taiwanese label as “made in China”, again because of the FACT that the Taiwan government believes itself to be the legitimate Chinese Republic. Of course, this kind of thing irritates the mainland communists to no end.