The iPhone 15 Pro Max smartphone ordered by a Reddit user turned out to be an Android fake
There are plenty of fakes of various goods today. For example, replica watches of the best Swiss brands can be purchased for a pittance (compared to the real cost of the originals), and not everyone can tell them apart at first glance, even when compared directly. Something similar happens in the smartphone market, where there have always been iPhone clones. And sometimes it leads to very strange stories.
One of these shared by a Reddit user, which drew the attention of 9to5Mac.
The incident took place in the UK. Over the weekend, a man with the nickname theEdmard ordered an iPhone 15 Pro Max through Apple’s website. He received tracking from Dynamic Parcel Distribution and everything went smoothly until he received the device.
After unpacking the smartphone, the man noticed a protective film on the display, which Apple does not include as standard. Then he suspected that the buyer had been sent a previously returned device.
When the customer turned on the smartphone, he saw that the backlight was on over the entire display area (which is atypical for OLED screens), and the bottom bezel was larger than the rest (which is also atypical for iPhones). There was no doubt that the received smartphone was not the one that was ordered.
The setup process already clearly showed that this was an Android smartphone with an iOS 17 “skin”. Of course, everything worked much worse than it should have. Having skipped entering his data, the buyer got to the desktop, where, among other things, there were already Facebook, YouTube, and TikTok applications, which should not be on a new iPhone.
The device itself worked terribly, and, for example, the camera application “resembled a slideshow” and “crashed” if you tried to use any interface elements.
The man contacted the company’s support and is waiting for the problem to be resolved.
He also made a good point that not every buyer has enough experience to immediately recognize a fake. This way, not only the smartphone but also the victim’s personal data can get to the attackers, because the fake will still offer to log in via Apple ID, enter bank card details, and immediately “slip in” applications of other popular services.
Moreover, this is not an isolated case. Mashable also notes that a similar story happened to another user. And there are also stories in the comments on Reddit where buyers received locked iPhone 14 Pro Max instead of iPhone 15 Pro Max. The company is in no hurry to refund or replace the device in such cases.
Apple also does not comment on the details of the investigation of these incidents and how the company plans to prevent them in the future.