While technology makes our lives easier, sometimes these tools can be used by malicious people for different purposes. This is exactly what happened in the Jiangsu province of China. A scammer used Apple’s “Find My iPhone” feature to scam people and demand ransom. However, he ended up in prison.
Fraudster who abused Apple’s ‘Find My iPhone’ feature, sentenced to 1 year in prison
A scammer based in China posted fake ads online claiming to offer a “ service to play paid games for free .” The ads featured games that were especially popular with young people, and naturally attracted the attention of gamers. The scammer told users that they would need to log in to the Apple account he provided to play the paid games for free.
The scammer then used Apple’s “Find My iPhone” feature to remotely lock the people’s phones. That is, users were trapped after logging into the Apple account the scammer provided. The victims were forced to pay a certain amount to unlock their phones. They were faced with a sort of digital ransom demand.
Using this method, the scammer victimized 10 people and earned a total of $1,000 in ill-gotten gains. Fortunately, the incident did not last long. When one of the scammed individuals reported the incident to the authorities, an investigation was quickly launched. The individual was caught in a short time and brought before the court. The court sentenced the man to 1 year in prison and seized the ill-gotten gains as well as the phone he used in the crime.
Ultimately, such incidents have shown us once again that technology can be as harmful as it is beneficial to our lives. Life-saving features such as “Find My iPhone” in particular can be used for very different purposes when they fall into the hands of malicious people. No matter how much technology develops, users need to be more careful and conscious in the digital world.
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