In a world where technology is advancing rapidly, scams and deceptions are also making their way.
A recent example is the case of the Liao family, where three brothers and their wives were involved in a complicated scheme involving the Liao family Distributed more than 10,000 counterfeit iPhones and iPads to Apple Stores in the US and Canada.
Last year, two of the brothers were sentenced to 41 months in prison, while their wives received three years probation. Now the third brother also has to face the consequences of his actions.
Zhiwei “Allen” Liao, the brother in question, was sentenced to 51 months in prison for leading this illegal international trade in counterfeit Apple products. In addition to the sentence, he was ordered to forfeit two homes, $120,370 in cash and more than 200 Apple devices that were seized during the investigation.
How exactly did this scam work?
Court documents show that the Liao brothers imported more than 10,000 counterfeit iPhones and iPads from China whose identification numbers (IMEI and serial numbers matched those of genuine devices sold in the US and Canada).
They then sent their accomplices to Apple stores in both countries to replace the counterfeit products with authentic devices. Apple suffered an estimated loss of $6.1 million as a result of this fraud.
Zhiwei Liao sent legitimately acquired authentic products to China, where they were sold for a significant amount of money.
Although it is unclear how they obtained the real serial numbers, this allowed the brothers and their team to return the counterfeit products to Apple. And in most cases, Apple replaced them with original devices without suspicion. The devices apparently passed an initial test, at least for non-technically experienced sales employees.
