Sam Oliver
Two stores at Maryland's Arundel Mills Mall were discovered by police to be carrying hundreds of knock-off Apple products and components, falsely being offered under the guise of authorized Apple repair shops.
Counterfeit Apple products seized by Maryland police. Credit: WBAL TV.
Police estimate the value of the items found at the stores to be around $89,000, according to WBAL TV in Baltimore, Md. The counterfeit items were reportedly taken from raids on the mall's Cyberion store and ST Tech Pros kiosk.
The products seized include colored iPhone conversion kits, allowing customers to give a new look to their smartphone. But the parts were improperly adorned with the official Apple logo, suggesting to customers that the knock-off parts were authentic.
Other fake parts included covers, cases and replacement screens, for both the iPhone and iPad. Police had an Apple representative check the items to confirm they were fakes.
In addition to putting the Apple logo on non-Apple parts, the shops were allegedly engaged in other activities, such as putting black stickers over parts to cover up the fact that they were counterfeit.
Authorities also said that the unauthorized repair shops were taking iPhones and replacing interior parts with inferior components not built or provided by Apple. The raids were conducted after a 7-month investigation.
Dealing with counterfeit products is not a new issue for Apple, though most of the company's troubles with knock-offs tend to stem from China, not the U.S. Some have even gone as far as to build entire fake Apple stores in China.
Otterbox, a case maker that specializes in Apple's iPhone, also announced this month that it had shut down a counterfeit operation and secured a $2 million court victory against a New York-based company named S&P Trading Inc.
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29 Comments
The Apple logo is bigger than Apple. It belongs to the world! [i]j/k[/i]
It's crazy that people are manufacturing this stuff. To go through all that trouble and not have your own brand name to print on it? That's just weird...
It's crazy that people are manufacturing this stuff. To go through all that trouble and not have your own brand name to print on it? That's just weird...
People want a quality brand, probably with a good warranty. Thinking about it, I wonder if any Samsung knock-offs have been made?
Nice to see someone getting arrested over this, but where I live if you stopped this sort of thing, you would have to arrest tens of thousands of people a year. Even high end stores downtown sell fake (Apple branded) chargers for iPods right in the front window. How would you get a pink one otherwise? Apple doesn't sell those.
"$89K worth of counterfeit Apple products seized by police from Maryland mall"
Are they talking about Samsung? ~