That’s very scary! The fact that people are now manufacturing Android phones dressed as iPhones and switching them out during the ordering process makes me nervous. It’s a good thing you are an experienced customer. Thank goodness you knew what to look for. Thanks for the warning ⚠️!

do u work in security or something? lol maybe u were specifically targeted. that's crazy

That is just r/Crazy

and i thought ordering a phone from amazon was safe

I hope you didn’t put any person information into this device 😬

Yep never buying a device like this from Amazon or any other seller that does not vet their inventory.

Where are you based? I got the same phone (model, config) delivered by DPD on the same day.

Do the serial number and IMEI of the device match the numbers on the box?

Similar experience. Sent an iPhone 14 Pro Max in for replacement about three weeks after I bought it. Apple denied the claim stating “phone not returned.”

Long story short, when I mailed my phone in using their pre-posted packaging, someone at FedEx intercepted it and replaced with weights. Only saving grace is the thief (assuming a FedEx employee) didn’t replace with an exact weight, so they were able to determine that the contents were tampered with after I initially dropped off.

The fix: I only pickup from an Apple Store now.

The EMID on the box doesn't match the EMID on the screen and I suspect the serial number doesn’t either. Was the box shrink-wrapped and had seals on the sides? Re-shrink wrapping isn’t hard, but the box will usually show damage if the seals are removed. As others have said, this looks more like someone tampered with it in shipping.

This is why you record your unboxing.

Same thing happened to me except there was no phone in the box. Now I will only purchase in-store.

I’ll tell you exactly what happened.

Someone bought a phone, replaced it with a fake phone. Took it to an Apple Store and the sales employee must’ve been in a hurry and returned it. Not just returned it but returned it in a state where it’s a closed box (which should never be selected as this means it’s completely unopened and ready to be instantly sold) The device got sent back to the warehouse or went into local inventory and the rest is history. Some unfortunate sap (sorry) is getting it and now has to deal with this crazy situation that takes around a week to resolve. But apples lost prevention team will get it straightened out.

Cool lesson to always always record deliveries like that in one shot from it arriving to totally unboxed and verified. Otherwise nobody is going to believe it wasn’t you that swapped the phone.

For a fake, it actually doesn't look half bad lol.

Send an email to Apple executive dept.

I received a new MacBook through DPD last week and someone had evidently tried to get in the package. They couldn’t get in without breaking the box seal thankfully but I still made them aware and checked it over throughly.

I doubt this has come from Apple, even if someone returns a phone it goes through loads of checking before being resold. Someone in the distribution chain has swooped it out knowing exactly what it is. You did the right thing taking loads of photos and I hope this isn’t a pain for you to contest but it might be.

This is supply chain tampering, law enforcement will be keen to investigate.

The theft which now seems to be happening at courier companies is quite worrying. I was anxious about getting my iPhone 15 Pro delivered, having read multiple accounts of expensive items being swapped at Amazon, but this is the first time I’ve read about it from Apple directly, who always seem to use big contracted companies like DPD or FedX as opposed to the “man in a van” type arrangements Amazon often uses.

It’s getting to the point where for every delivery of an expensive item, you need to film opening the door, taking the box and opening it as a single take so you at least have some evidence and leverage with the supplier. I’ve read it taking weeks and hours of time to get sorted as Amazon don’t believe you, even though they must know due to the extent that it happens, they have a big problem with the theft of electrical items.

that took a lot of effort both on hardware side and software side to approximate an iphone! JFC

Oh boy. Contact Apple, they will be all over it, 100%. If there is something Tim Apple hates, it is someone messing with his distribution chain.

Do you have picture of the brown box it was delivered in?

also seems likely someone did a “closed-box” return but swapped the device, was placed in inventory/sold to you.

had a situation at my store a few years ago where we received multiple returns, but the box was filled with cement to match the weight of the actual product. always something different every year ]:

Crazy. Every package I’ve gotten from Apple has been in such a nondescript box that there was no way of knowing it came from Apple. Even the return addresses don’t give any indication. Definitely happened early in the chain of shipping.

Long story short, someone at DPD swapped it. Apple will refuse to replace it. Check here

I had a similar experience with my 15 Pro Max order. Received a 14 Pro Max instead. It was brand new and sealed and confirmed to be real by Apple. The shipping carton also appeared to be sealed, although after closer inspection, one end looked like it had been opened and re-sealed.

Apple completed an investigation and found that there was absolutely no way an iPhone 14 could have ended up in there. They refused to replace the device. Some people have even received better devices than they ordered, but are still refused a replacement.

In the end, I sent a Karen email to Tim Cook and they agreed to replace my device “as a gesture of goodwill”. Others had this luck? too, but at least one has been denied.

Apple don’t provide any details of their investigation nor will they discuss how they are confident in a 0% error rate in their distribution processes. But one of the victims on the above link has been told by a mobile network that there may be a scam involving courier employees and a device that can scan Apple parcels to determine the contents in order to switch it for fake/stolen phones. Sounds farfetched. I definitely just thought they’d mixed mine up, but that was before it took me 7 weeks to get a £1,500 phone that I’d paid for and found a dozen other people with the same issue.

Yes please keep us updated. I am very interested, how apple handles this. I think since apple has very controlled processes, i don‘t wanna be the guy which caused the problem (it is kind of social engineering and i think apple going hard on this).

Ordered an Apple Watch direct from Apple a few years ago. It took 3 replacements to get it to me because it kept being stolen from the package. It finally came down to the packaging tape that was used to close the box again. Apple uses their own specific type of packaging tape. It ended up that FedEx had a group of people stealing Apple products. It was finally sent through a different FedEx branch and I opened it in front of the delivery driver to confirm it was in there. Anyways, I said all of this to confirm the packaging tape with Apple with pictures of the box.

the person who was shipping it might have done a sneaky switch

Carrier definitely messed with it. They know exactly what’s in your package from Apple.

I’m curious to see how Apple handles the situation.

In the tracking info, was it shipped from their warehouse overseas in China/India or from somewhere closer? I remember the iPhone 12 I bought came directly from China.

I’m guessing it had to have been switched at the delivery level, maybe at the shipping warehouse or by a courier. The cardboard boxes Apple uses to ship their products are pretty standardized and obvious to people who’ve seen them before.

What did Apple say? Did Apple have you bring the fake phone to the Apple Store or ship it back to them for investigation? Did they give you a time frame on when they’ll get back to you?

Organized crime has re-infiltrated several shippers. Fun fact: UPS was started as liquor-smuggling front by Al Capone.

This is wild. I have heard about these fake iPhones. Never seen one though. It looks like a modified Motorola judging by the chin at the bottom.

‪People thinking Apple actually shipped this guy a fake is hilarious. It’s obviously been switched out en-route. So people are so dumb. ‬

I wonder if it's some specifically made fake iphone or maybe an actual android phone mocked up to like an iphone

What’s going to happen to the fake iPhone you received after Apple sends you over the replacement?