Anyone who's had their phone stolen knows how upsetting it can be, and it's pretty much impossible to find out where it ended up.
However, one unfortunate victim found out exactly where their phone went - but it wasn't much help to them.
Reddit user brandawnnn shared screenshots to the subreddit r/Scams of messages they were receiving from China, after having their iPhone stolen in Los Angeles.
Advert
The phone appeared to have been sold to a fence or second-hand shop, then sent to China to be re-sold far from the owner's area, but with one key thing holding the new scamming owners back.
The Reddit user never removed the phone from their AppleID account, meaning it was still tied to their details and they could remotely lock the phone - something the scammers couldn't do anything about.
On that level the post is a good lesson in the importance of device security, and how you can stop thieves from profiting off your misfortune by ensuring you have proper device locks set up.
What makes it way more crazy, though, is that the scammers in China tried to get out of this bind by attempting to force the Reddit user into removing the phone from their account, so that it could be used again.
Advert
This takes the form of a series of long messages, which start off as attempts to masquerade as Apple's support team (which would never text a user like this).
When these attempts don't work, the scammers change angle and pretend to be an older person who's "very sad" about the situation and bought the iPhone at a "second-hand electrical appliance market" and shouldn't be blamed for it being locked.
Since this doesn't work either, the mask drops and the scammers attempt to get threatening, saying that they'll extract "personal information and everything about you" from it before selling the information on the black market, before escalating further to some horrific threats of violence.
Advert
There's even a video file sent through of someone brandishing a gun - although users commented to say that this video is one frequently used by scammers, and isn't necessarily the real person behind the messages.
In fact, people in the comments are full of praise for the poster's nerve, and reassure them that the scammers can't do anything if the poster doesn't remove the phone from their account.
One wrote: "They're screwed as long as you DON'T remove your phone. Block them." Another was equally pleased with the situation, saying: "Yea haha, it’s basically a paperweight until you remove it. So don’t remove it and enjoy knowing they’ll have to sell it for parts and won’t actually be able to use the phone".
Of course, even in that case, the Reddit poster is still down a phone, but the satisfaction of seeing how angry the scammers became over the situation has to count for something.