Besides the craze for the industry leading Apple and Samsung smartphones, there is also a market for cheaper options that offer bang for their buck like the Xiaomi Redmi phones. However, there are many sellers who are selling phones that offer features found in branded phones at what seem like bargain-prices on paper. Yet they are nothing but scams playing upon the demand for high-end gadgets with advanced specifications and low prices.
Technology influencer and UK’s largest tech YouTuber Arun Maini’s (better known as “MrWhoseTheBoss”) investigation into one such company spearheading such rackets helped unmask a scam.
Products with very random yet familiar sounding names are advertised at an unbelievably low price. These gadgets advertise features which sound too good to be true. The advertising of such offerings includes catchphrases like “The Most Innovative Smartphone in 20 years.”
The company selling such products bills itself and it requests immediate payment by electronic transfer or a wire surplus.
But the phone does not reach them. In the rare even that it arrives, the customer will get a defunct one. The online outlets these phones have limited information about delivery and other policies.
And once somebody gets a hold of the scam, these fake manufacturers then develop new websites and keep other similar scam going.
The addresses on these sham websites mention those countries. Punching the addresses in Google Maps only revealed how those so-called company locations were actually residential buildings for the most part.
One way to protect yourself against such cons is to check if the website or social media page has a refund or return policies — that too, fair ones. The genuine online shopping and auction sites have detailed complaints or dispute handling processes.
These sites had bogus return addresses.