Police call repeat iPhone fraud incident 'regrettable'

RTHK - Oct 17, 2026

Police said on Saturday they received more than 110 reports of suspected misuse of credit cards linked to iPhone Duo pre-sale transactions. The amount involved was about HK$4.6 million, with the largest single loss reaching nearly HK$230,000 – equivalent to about 12 iPhone Duos. No arrests have been made so far. Senior inspector Lo Chun-kong from the Cyber Security and Technology Crime Bureau called the repeated incident "extremely regrettable," after a similar situation happened just last month during Apple's other iPhone pre-orders. Lo pointed out that since then, the police advised Apple multiple times to implement 3D-Secure (3DS) to verify online credit card payments. “When a transaction has to be carried out using credit card, the issuing bank will request the card holder to carry out additional verification, for example, input a one-time password, or carry out confirmation using the bank's mobile app to safeguard the public's assets,” Lo said. “But unfortunately, Apple still had not activated 3DS during the pre-sale on Friday night, and failed to stop the issuance of similar fraud cases.” He went on to say that the force was highly concerned that Apple has not actively fulfilled its corporate responsibilities, which fraudsters exploited. The force hopes Apple will implement effective measures to prevent similar...

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