Scammers sold 300,000 iPhones made using defective parts from a Foxconn factory

[The1Dickens]

On 12/19/2019 at 8:40 AM, ryao said:

I think the more prudent question would be how could a person detect an iPhone made with defective parts.

They likely track which parts get discarded by batch or something. Everything has some way of being tracked in manufacturing. If a batch is discarded that had a first-pass yield of 4%, then someone could, in theory, take those parts and make a fully functional device even though it was discarded for being "defective". That batch number is logged somewhere, so when a device comes in for repair (or someone receives it in a repair center) that data could be read at Apple HQDB and then trigger a flag in the system.

 

Or, there could be some internal struggle and one of the operators could "leak" your operation to Apple themselves and ruin everything, as what seems to have been the case here.

[Gamer Schnitzel]

they deserve it for manufacturing in china. as if china already doesnt fuck up the western economies enough? rich pigs living in mansions on the beach destroy western economies by outsourcing every single shit to china and india just so they can make even more billions so honestly they deserve this and a lot more. if you're an apple fanboy FUCK OFF and dont quote me, thank you.

[ryao]

2 hours ago, Gamer Schnitzel said:

they deserve it for manufacturing in china. as if china already doesnt fuck up the western economies enough? rich pigs living in mansions on the beach destroy western economies by outsourcing every single shit to china and india just so they can make even more billions so honestly they deserve this and a lot more. if you're an apple fanboy FUCK OFF and dont quote me, thank you.

The guys hurt by this are 300,000+ people who were sold defective devices or paid for repairs with defective parts, not Apple. The number of fake phones sold is equal to about 0.05% of Apple’s annual sales. That is practically a rounding error. Not to mention that these parts were supposed to be destroyed anyway. Apple really did not lose much, which likely contributed to how this operation went undetected for so long.

[Guest]

On 12/19/2019 at 1:24 PM, ryao said:

The glass is made by Corning, not Foxconn. The camera sapphire is made by another company. I do not know which.

 

That being said, things like a completed logic board made to order for Apple with chips made according to Apple’s chip designs are not on the same level as resistors and capacitors. I doubt anyone has ever needed to replace a camera sensor unless they exposed it to a laser and if they did, they certainly did not replace the actual sensor by itself.

 

All of this misses the point that >300,000 people got scammed by substandard parts (not board level components) that were assembled to make complete phones. Presumably, others got third party repairs using defective “genuine” parts too.

Its actually pretty cool. On Aliexpress and such websites you can buy iPhones that look, feel, are technically the real thing, run iOS etc, same everything - however all/most of their internals are fake. Probably the biggest giveaway to that without opening it up is the cheaper storage memory used, they feel a lot more sluggish installing apps. 

[amdorintel]

On 12/20/2019 at 10:03 AM, Gamer Schnitzel said:

they deserve it for manufacturing in china. as if china already doesnt fuck up the western economies enough? rich pigs living in mansions on the beach destroy western economies by outsourcing every single shit to china and india just so they can make even more billions so honestly they deserve this and a lot more. if you're an apple fanboy FUCK OFF and dont quote me, thank you.

amen @Gamer Schnitzel

i like your style

 

consumers do not want to pay a premium for a product just because its made in North America