A Chinese national caught smuggling fake Apple products into the United States has been handed a three-year prison sentence.
Jianhua “Jeff” Li pled guilty to trafficking more than 40,000 devices, including counterfeit iPhone and iPad knockoffs, back in February. He made more than $1.1 million from the scheme.
Xiaomi has a history of shamelessly ripping off bigger brands, and nine times out of ten, its chosen target is Apple.
The Chinese company has previously cloned the iPhone, iPad, MacBook, and more — without a single shred of fear that it might one day feel the wrath of Apple’s legal department.
Xiaomi’s latest ripoff is its own version of Memoji, and it brazenly stole Apple’s own commercials to promote it on a number of retail channels this week.
Apple has started removing duplicate VoIP apps from the App Store.
The purge comes after a report highlighted a shady practice some developers have been using to game App Store search results. Plenty of clones still remain in other categories, however.
Now that rival smartphone makers have had some time to follow in Apple’s footsteps, you don’t have to spend $1,000 on an iPhone X to enjoy features like facial recognition and an edge-to-edge screen. For instance, this handset looks almost exactly like Apple’s latest flagship, and yet it costs just $100.
But don’t be fooled by its pretty face. This unashamed iPhone X clone is as ugly as sin under the surface, and its poor excuse for security is even scarier.
Just like every other smartphone maker, Nokia now offers its own iPhone X clone.
The Nokia X5 gives buyers a 5.86-inch edge-to-edge display and impressive specifications at an amazingly affordable price tag. There’s just one problem for now.
We’re still eagerly anticipating Nintendo’s first The Legend of Zelda game for mobile. iOS users in China may have briefly believed the wait was over this week when Breath of the Wild landed in the App Store — except it wasn’t actually Breath of the Wild.
It turns out Apple approved a shameless Zelda clone that, unsurprisingly, doesn’t deliver everything its description promises.
Samsung’s design team avoided ripping off the iPhone X’s notch for the Galaxy S9, but that could be about to change. The South Korean company has now patented its first iPhone X clone, complete with a notch at the top of its screen.
Haters greeted the iPhone X’s “notch” with overwhelming criticism, and yet, a growing number of rival smartphone makers are stealing it. OnePlus is another one of them, according to these leaked photos, which reveal the upcoming OnePlus 6 ahead of its official debut.
Xiaomi has ripped off the iPhone X’s control gestures for its upcoming Mi Mix 2S smartphone. A leaked video reveals users will control the device with swipes after Xiaomi did away with its Home button.
There are lots of wonderful things that rival smartphone makers could steal from the iPhone X, but its notch shouldn’t be one of them. It seems some Chinese vendors didn’t get that memo — as you can see from these photos of one iPhone clone with a notch of its own.
Apple is expected to make its flagship iPhone even bigger this year, so what do you do if you prefer smaller devices? You could check out the Soyes 7S, a super-cute iPhone 7 Plus clone that has a miniature 2.54-inch display.
Meet the UMIDIGI G, a device that isn’t ashamed to be a complete ripoff of Apple’s latest smartphone. It runs Google’s latest Android 7.0 Nougat operating system, and it’s super-affordable at just $79.99. Its specifications aren’t bad, either — but you shouldn’t buy one.
Google is planning to replace its beloved Nexus smartphones with new devices that will fall into the Pixel brand. They’ll get their official unveiling on October 4, but new photos that have leaked out early suggest they look just like iPhone clones.
You won’t be able to get your hands on the real iPhone 7 until it goes on sale in September, but gadget vendors in China have the next best thing: For just $150, you can pick up an iPhone 7 clone that looks just like the real thing.
Android has long been the best platform for smartphone buyers on a budget, and now entry to Google’s ecosystem is even more affordable.
Indian handset maker Ringing Bells just launched the new Freedom 251, an ultra affordable device that looks a lot like an iPhone, priced at 251 rupees — or about $3.67.
Call it karma if you want, but after years of copying Apple’s iPhone designs, Samsung’s much-praised Galaxy S6 smartphone has apparently already received its first knockoff.
Made by a company called No.1, the phone looks extremely similar to Samsung’s new device, only minus the Samsung logo, featuring the Note 4’s user interface instead of the S6’s, and sporting a wonky home button which looks like it’s a firm shake away from falling out.
Everyone wants to make a mint in the App Store. But while some developers slave away in coding dens on original ideas, others see a get-rich-quick shortcut through copying.
The result is an App Store littered with clones, frustrated devs, and Apple stuck playing a never-ending game of whack-a-mole to police the rip-off apps.
“I noticed a clone that was an exact replica, including the exact same UI, same App Store screenshots, and same App Store description copied word-for-word,” Yo creator Or Arbel tells Cult of Mac.
A few weeks back we wrote about Yo spoof Hodor, but it seems that there’s another more pressing clone out there, called Yolo, which Yo founder Or Arbel describes as “a complete fake copy of our Yo app.”
In response to Yolo, Arbel has filed a complaint with Apple, asking it to remove Yolo from the App Store since it allegedly infringes on Arbel’s copyright and trademark.
The first Macintosh clone in the world was not one of the Apple sanctioned systems released in 1995, such as those from companies like PowerComputing, Radius, Umax or Daystar Digital. Nor was it the Outbound laptop in 1989, a hybrid system produced using Mac ROMs taken from working Mac Plus systems.
No, the first Macintosh clone was the Unitron Mac 512, a unauthorized copy of the 512k “Fat Mac” produced by a Brazilian company in 1986. And it was a pretty darn impressive copy. The fallout from that effort nearly help start a trade war between Brazil and the United States; to prevent theft of Intellectual Property, Apple and other companies lobbied Congress to hike import taxes on Brazilian goods like oranges and shoes as a response.
And as we know, nobody messes with Tropicana …
It’s not a widely known story. Pieces of this long-forgotten chapter in Mac history can be found scattered on websites around the world. Here is the fascinating tale of the first Macintosh clone in the world.
Here’s a riddle to start Thanksgiving in style: what looks like an iPad mini, costs only $177, ships anywhere in the world, and runs… Android?
It’s none other than the Chuwi V88, and it’s a Chinese tablet designed to appeal to the would-be iPad owner on a budget — or at least a would-be Android owner, who wants people to think that they’re really an iPad owner.
Good thing you listened to us this morning when we posted about a new Google Play app that seemed to let you send Apple iMessages via an Android app.
When something seems to good to be true, it usually is.
In this instance, Google agrees, and has pulled the app from the Google Play Store for violating its terms of use. A spokesperson emailed ComputerWorld, saying, “We remove apps from Google Play that violate our policies.”
Fairly clear, right? As we pointed out this morning, the iMessage Chat app for Android devices turned out to be sending data, including users’ Apple IDs, through another server in China, which is kind of an easy way to steal people’s sensitive information. Apple IDs and passwords can be used to purchase apps, books, and music from the App Store, as well as connect to iCloud data, which can have addresses and more personal info.
While the iPhone 5C will certainly be cheaper than Apple’s high-end iPhone 5S, it’s likely to be too expensive still for many in emerging markets. But smartphone clone specialists Goophone already have an Android-powered alternative in the pipeline that will sell for just $100 in China.
Called the “i5C,” the device looks almost identical to the real iPhone 5C based on the leaks we’ve seen. Just don’t expect a Retina display.
Apple’s Passbook feature in iOS hasn’t really taken off as quickly as people thought it would, but that hasn’t prevented Samsung from throwing developers into making its own Passbook clone. We first got our first look at Samsung Wallet back in February at MWC, but the the app is finally ready for primetime and available on Google Play.
The app is only supported on the Galaxy S3, S4, Note 1 and Note 2, and you have to sign-in with one of those silly Samsung accounts, but if you’re already nose deep in S Health, S Beam, Samsung Link and all the other half-baked Samsung apps you’ll feel right at home.
Apple hasn’t announced the iPhone 5S yet, but Chinese clone specialist GooPhone has already created a cheap knockoff of it. And it has done a pretty incredible job. As you’ll see in the video below, the “i5S” looks identical to the real thing, and you probably wouldn’t even know it was a clone. That is, until you started using it.