Counterfeit iPhone traffickers behind $6.1 million con at Apple Stores are going to prison

Apple Store front in mall with lit apple logo on top and many people inside
Apple Store grand opening in Columbia, Maryland. | Image: Umar Shakir / The Verge

It’s normally pretty easy to get your broken iPhone replaced at Apple’s Genius Bar under your AppleCare plan, but a (criminally) enterprising sibling duo found a way to trick the system by swapping counterfeit devices with real ones. Unfortunately for them, they got caught in 2019 attempting to exchange 10,000 fake Apple products over the course of eight years, and this week, they’ve been sentenced to federal prison, the Times of San Diego reports.

San Diego residents Zhimin and Zhiting Liao (also known as Jimmy and Allen Liao) netted themselves around $6.1 million of genuine Apple products, including iPhones and iPads, that they ended up exporting to buyers in foreign countries. The brothers received 41-month federal prison sentences....

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