Texas man busted with over two dozen counterfeit Apple devices
A Texas man has been charged with trademark counterfeiting after he was caught with more than $20,000 worth of counterfeit Apple products.
Image Credit: KPRC Click2Houston
On March 29, Conelle Davis was stopped by the Houston police while driving a stolen Toyota Camry. Upon inspecting the vehicle, authorities found five iPads, 11 Apple Watches, and 13 AirPods.
If these items were genuine, their total value would have been over $20,000.
The Harris County Precinct Five Constable's Office confirmed that the investigated packaging and Apple products were real. But the actual products inside did not match their descriptions. For instance, a box labeled as a new iPad Pro may have contained an older, used, or broken product.
"I haven't seen this before," Dennis Underwood, CEO of cybersecurity company CyberCrucible told Click2Houston.
"It's really interesting because just about every one example you can give to say, 'Oh, this is how you check for a counterfeit.' The counterfeiters and the people who swap out devices, they read the same blog post, they read the same how-to and so really, it's not just one thing you need to look for. It's a combination of things."
Davis has been arrested twice in Harris County for trademark counterfeiting. He has faced similar charges elsewhere.
One day prior, police in Northern Ireland seized more than $750,000 worth of fake iPhones, AirPods, and iPhone cases.
In late March, the head of an international gang behind return fraud of 10,000 counterfeit iPhones and iPads was sentenced to prison for more than four years.
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Comments
I was reading with interest out of curiosity as to what a counterfeit iPhone or Apple Watch would even be. The much maligned Apple ecosystem and walled garden would pretty much render an actual counterfeit (e.g., a fake hardware and OS copy) useless. I guess the real answer to what would a counterfeit Apple device be is pretty much a discarded or counterfeit Apple device package with any sort of garbage inside that has a similar weight. The objective would presumably be to sell the box and disappear before the buyer can open it. Seems like the cost of building a device that is capable of getting through setup to even basic functionality would be prohibitive and pointless.
Notice the picture has 5 iPads, 11 Apple Watches and 12 AirPods. Some cop just got a new pair of headphones