Apple Developer's Account Restored After Compromised Gift Card Incident

"It's all fixed," says that Apple developer who was locked out of his Apple Account after redeeming a compromised Apple Gift Card. "A lovely man from Singapore, working for Apple Executive Relations, who has been calling me every so often for a couple of days, has let me know it's all fixed. It looks like the gift card I tried to redeem, which did not work for me, and did not credit my account, was already redeemed in some way (sounds like classic gift card tampering), and my account was caught by that.

"Obviously it's unacceptable that this can happen, and I'm still trying to get more information out of him, but at least things are now mostly working.

"Strangely, he did tell me to only ever buy gift cards from Apple themselves; I asked if that means Apple's supply chain of Blackhawk Network, InComm, and other gift card vendors is insecure, and he was unwilling to comment."
Updates to his original blog post now include a frequently-asked questions list:

• Yes, I have the receipt for the card, including the activation receipt.
• Yes, the card was legitimately purchased, it's not from eBay.
• Yes, I have contacted the retailer.
• Yes, I do have backups... No, I don't know why parts of the account still kinda work, and parts don't.
• No, I didn't write this article with AI...
• Yes, Apple really did use emojis in their Live Chat...

Thereâ(TM)s a scam - somebody has to be the v

[gnasher719]

It seems he tried to redeem a $500 gift card that was already redeemed. So obviously _some_ fraud and some scammerinvolved. Apple decided that since they were not the ones at fault, they were not making themselves the fraud victims and pay $500 to the scammer.

Re:Thereâ(TM)s a scam - somebody has to be th

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

There's definitely a scam somewhere in the gift card's history; the guy writing about his situation is upset because Apple glassed his account over it, not over the gift card value. The process of not being credited for the gift card's code and then talking to the retailer to get one that hadn't been tampered with apparently went smoothly; but then the account and everything associated with it got terminated without comment or recourse.

Someone is presumably going to eat the value of the gift card, apparently the retailer either directly or through merchant fees and the payment card processor doing it; but the moral of the story is that you can, without recourse unless you are enough of a VIP to raise a fuss that reaches 'Apple Executive Relations', lose everything connected to your account if you inadvertently interact with a gift card that has been used for some sort of scam activity; even if you have proof that you purchased it from a normal retailer that sells gift cards; rather than some dodgy flea market arrangement that screams 'bagman'/'too good to be true'.

Re:

[drinkypoo]

but the moral of the story is that you can, without recourse unless you are enough of a VIP to raise a fuss that reaches 'Apple Executive Relations', lose everything connected to your account

Nah, that's the reason for the moral. The actual moral is: don't fuck with Apple gift cards — neither a buyer nor a redeemer be. Apple has certainly taught us all a lesson, and that lesson is that their gift card system is insecure and they will punish legitimate customers for their lack of security. Whether it's even possible to make a gift card secure is irrelevant to that lesson.

The lesson of the story

[Artem S. Tashkinov]

The real lesson is believing you actually own what you buy online. You don't. Anything digital can be revoked instantly, without explanation, and often without meaningful recourse or support.

It's only when you get enough publicity that you could be noticed and get back your marbles but sadly it will not work for the vast majority of us.

Ultimately we need better laws or lawmakers to protect our digital goods.

The good old “If you run to the press and tr

[unami]

it never helps.” from Apple. In fact, as proven again and again, unless you manage to make a big enough fuss in the press there's no way to get behind their passive-aggressive wall of "fuck you"-smiles and get something from them. If you don't have enough connections and public awareness then you're just SOL.

Footguns

[PetiePooo]

I was just in Target and looking at a kiosk full of apple gift cards. I was thinking I need to print out a bunch of self-adhesive labels with "DO NOT BUY" and a QR code linking to this saga, and put them on the back of a few of the cards.

Until companies operating at scale guarantee some right to good-faith arbitration or... what's the word I'm looking for... oh, yes. Service. Until they guarantee some level of friendly customer service, we must treat them as hostile entities not deserving of our trust

Yum Poisoned Apple

[Anonymous Coward]

The Apple logo is only partially consumed because it was full of poison and now you ded.

Cash - The Gift that keeps on giving

[Deathlizard]

And this is why you give out cash instead of gift cards. It doesn't tie the receiver to a particular product and some scammer from halfway across the world won't rip them off.

Re:

[belmolis]

Exactly. There's no need for everything to be on-line.

devil

[groobly]

Deal with the devil and there will be hell to pay.

Not impressed

[spazmonkey]

Now try fixing it for the thousands of people who are not famous Apple Developers with C-level execs on speed dial

In today's news

[alanw]

BBC News article: Rise in gift card scams as victims lose millions [bbc.co.uk]
According to experts, fraudsters target the cards online and in the shop to drain the money from them