Greg's Corner

Apple sued for gift card scam

By Greg Collier

We’ve said many times in the past that gift cards are the currency of scammers. Scammers frequently try to get their victims to pay in gift cards, since the cards can be drained if their funds almost instantly. Rarely do gift card scam victims ever get their money back. The retailers who issue these gift cards typically say that there’s nothing they can do once the gift card is spent. However, an ongoing lawsuit may have retailers changing their tune.

Apple is being sued in a class action lawsuit over their gift cards. Apple gift cards are highly sought after by scammers since they can use them to purchase high-end laptops and phones, then sell them for a profit. Although, the lawsuit claims that there is another use for Apple gift cards where Apple profits along with the scammers.

The lawsuit contends that Apple profits from these scams since scammers will use the gift cards to buy an app from the Apple App Store multiple times. The scammers run these apps and get a large cut from their sale. In turn, Apple gets a 30% cut of those sales. Apple is accused of allegedly being in a position to return the ill-gotten funds to victims, but chooses not to. According to the suit, Apple holds 100% of those funds for 4-6 weeks before paying the app developer/scammer.

Apple had been trying to have the suit dismissed, claiming that they have a refund policy printed on the gift cards that says no refund is possible once the card has been redeemed. Recently, a judge dismissed this claim, allowing the lawsuit to proceed.

It will be interesting to see if Apple will be held liable. If so, it may change the gift card scam economy. But don’t think this will slow scammers down any. Many scammers have already stopped asking for money in gift cards and instead are now asking for money in cryptocurrency, most commonly Bitcoin.

As always, the best way to avoid many of the gift card scams is to keep in mind that no legitimate business or agency will ask for payment in gift cards.

https://youtu.be/zWeGHzq1jGM