fake

Fake iPhone smuggler gets 3-year prison sentence

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iPhone XS box gold
Bag yours before they're all gone.
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

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.

See if your iPad charger is a fake before you burn down your house

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Can you spot the real iPad charger?

You probably don’t waste much thought on where to plug-in your iPhone, but not using a real Apple charger has its disadvantages. Not only are they higher quality, and safer, but they also charge faster than a 5W Chinese knockoff.

Millions of cheap Apple copycats make it difficult to tell whether a charger is the genuine article and have been blamed on everything from iPad explosions to spontaneous electrocutions, but thanks to a teardown comparison from Ken Shirriff there’s one little flaw to look for that gives the dangerous fakers away.

Just look for the signature.

This Android-Powered iPhone 5C Clone Will Cost Just $100 In China

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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.

Do New Apple Engineers Really Have To Work On Fake Projects?

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There’s a belief that Apple makes new engineers work on fake products until they can be trusted. According one of the company’s former employees, Adam Lashinsky, who published the book Inside Apple last January, the Cupertino company hires people into so-called “dummy positions” until it’s confident that they can be a part of upcoming products without leaking information.

But how accurate are those claims? We know Apple takes secrecy very seriously, but would it really waste time and money on giving people fake projects just to ensure they won’t squeal?

Almost certainly not.

IntelliScreenX Scam Hits The App Store And Should Be Avoided At All Costs

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Fake.
Fake.

Every so often, an iOS developer attempts to make a quick buck by creating a simple app, naming it after a hugely popular jailbreak tweak, then releasing it in the App Store with the same logo and screenshots. That’s exactly what JB Solutions has done with IntelliScreenX, a $0.99 app that promises to be the ultimate notification center for your lock screen. In reality, it’s nothing more than a nasty alarm clock.

This Is What The iPad Mini Will Look Like In Your Hand

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It's fake, but it looks impressive.
It's fake, but it looks impressive.

The iPad mini has appeared in a series of images that show the 7.85-inch device fully assembled for the first time. It’s unlikely the device in these images is genuine — it appears to be nothing more than a third-party mockup — but it gives us a great idea of the iPad mini’s size, its features, and what the real thing might look like in your hands.

Lovely Lego Leica Look-a-Like

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If this took photos, I would buy it.

There’s making things out of Lego, and then there’s making things out of Lego. And H.Y. Leung’s amazing white Leica M8 is firmly in the latter camp. His replica rangefinder might just be the best Lego fake we’ve ever seen (outside of anything to do with Star Wars, of course).

Can You Tell This Phony iPhone 4S From The Real Thing? [Video]

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Unreal. This phony iPhone 4S found in Turkey looks and feels exactly like the real thing up until you turn it on… and even then, if you weren’t already familiar with what an iPhone’s low battery warning looks like, you might mistake it for the real thing. This is why you should either buy your gadgets from an Apple Store, or test them extensively before buying.

New Apple Engineers Build Fake Products Until They Can Be Trusted

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Becoming an Apple engineer could well be one of the most exciting careers currently available in the technology industry, but don’t expect to working on the iPhone 5 during your first week. It seems the Cupertino company is so obsessed with secrecy that new employees are made to work on “fake” devices for months, until they can be trusted not to leak them.

Chinese Apple Store Generously Troubleshoots Knockoff MacBook Air

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Having watched Mark Malkoff’s hilarious video earlier this week, we now know it’s possible to have a pizza delivered to your local Apple store, take your pet goat to check out the latest Mac minis, and get your iPhone repaired while you’re dressed as Darth Vadar. But will a real Apple store help you troubleshoot your knockoff MacBook Air?

This is one in China did!

Watch A Fake Steve Jobs Rehearse His iPhone 5 Keynote

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If you haven’t had a good laugh today, you should check out this video that’s been circulating of “Steve Jobs” rehearsing his iPhone 5 introduction keynote.

It’s absolutely hilarious to me that anyone would think this video is real, especially after hearing Steve say the iPhone 5 is going to have its own version of smell-o-vision. I also didn’t realize Steve Jobs sounded a lot like George W. Bush, but he does in this video.

The best part though is when Steve decides it’s time to suit up in his “go-time” sneakers, does a quick in-place foot shuffle, then compares the airy weight of his newly donned sneakers to the lightness of the new iPhone 5.

[via Tuaw]

Images Surface of iPod Touch with Capacitive Home Button, 128GB Storage

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Images have surfaced of an iPod touch equipped with a capacitive home screen button and 128GB of storage space. The device is marked with a “DVT-1” badge previously found on an iPod touch discovered back in 2010, and thought to be the code Apple uses to identify prototype devices.

Other than the capacitive home button and the increased storage, it doesn’t look like anything else is different in these pictures with regards to hardware. However, what’s interesting is that it looks like the device is running version 4.2.1 of iOS, suggesting that it may have been in testing for some time.

The quality of the pictures is poor, and it looks as though the build quality of the device is just as bad – indicating that the device featured is rather a fake than a next-generation iPod prototype.