Fighting flash fraud on Ebay

Having had positive feedback from the victim of the listing above (and another that ended the same day) seller gizmo-sc listed a third of these obvious fake 32GB USB flash drives. In the listing it states:

Dies ist eine Privatauktion,deshalb gibt es keine Garantie und Rücknahme!!!

- oh right then, so no gaurantee and return policy! Why does this not surprise us one little bit?

As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

Seller should19160 (registered on ebay Canada) had a feedback score of -3 at the time of writing and was no longer listing anything for sale. Read the rest of this entry »

This 64GB Kingston USB flash drive listed by onbeatoffers is a fake and will trash users’ files. Kingston do not make this type of drive in 64GB capacity, as a quick check on their website will confirm. The use of a private listing suggests the seller may know this is fake. We strongly advise against buying flash drives in private listings – it is usually a sign of deliberate fraud.

We advise everyone to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

A look at feedback for seller samfadhel06 suggests to us that this is another seller of fake flash drives. This seller already has a negative comment about this item not working:

It doesn’t seem as though the seller dealt with the buyer’s complaint in the way an honest seller would; by providing a working replacement (or if the item was out of stock) a refund. This makes us suspect that this is yet another fraudster on ebay.

We advise everyone to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

These 64GB USB flash drives from US seller e-treasure-stor-e are bound to be fakes that will trash users’ files. Read the rest of this entry »

Poor old snoopy fainted yet again when he saw the ebay listing below from babiespower.
Snoopy knows his USB flash drives and can say for a fact that there is no genuine USB flash drive with a capacity of 120GB.

He just isn’t coping with what he sees on ebay these days – so many fakes, so many victims of fraud. Read the rest of this entry »

We have reason to beleive that the 16GB Transcend SD sold by acesdistributing in the listing above is counterfeit and fake capacity. Users will find that photos etc will become corrupted or vanish after a while.
Read the rest of this entry »

UK ebay member thegeekyfreak sold the “32GB” USB flash drive shown on the left on October 13th for £16.00. The drive was sold as being faulty.

It was not faulty – it was a fake capacity flash drive sold by a known ebay fraudster.

This picture and the drive in question are very familiar to the frankenflash project. Every flash drive of this model we tested turned out to be fake capacity. Such drives are programmed to fool the operating system.
Read the rest of this entry »

This flash drive from seller djsmokey74 is fake capacity and will trash users’ data. Read the rest of this entry »

We posted about our suspicions about seller yiyaya_2003 on the 9th September. The seller has not stopped selling obvious fake capacity flash drives – though the seller seems to have met with only limited success. The flash drive above is a very obvious fake – anyone who buys one will end up with lost and corrupted files.

You can view the original post about the seller here.

We think the 16GB Sandisk USB flash drives (and the PNY ones) sold by burrc-2008 on ebay USA are counterfeit and fake capacity, no doubt the seller bought them from one of the many fraudulent suppliers in the far east. Read the rest of this entry »

Snoopy has shouted “good greif” and fallen off his dog-house in a faint.

He cannot beleive this listing from flworldseller! Snoopy says a 128GB Kingston DataTraveler 200 flash drive costs more to make than this ebay member is prepared to sell for. Is Snoopy right to faint off his dog-house? We think so.

Buyers can check with Kingston – if flworldseller is someone who can turn urine into wine then Kingston will be able to verify the serial numbers and confirm these drives as genuine. If not, anyone who bought one should immediately claim a refund through paypal!

We advise everyone who buys flash memory items to test them with the free program h2testw irrespective of where they were purchased – otherwise you run the risk of data loss and corruption.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have purchased a false capacity device on ebay.

We are informed that originally USA based seller flashdrives4less1 had seven of these listings for job lots of fake 64GB Kingston drives with the picture above. Read the rest of this entry »

Although pictures in both this listing and one in which seller russianznz is auctioning one of these rather than using buy it now clearly show a 64GB Kingston DataTraveler 150 drive no mention of the names Kingston or DataTraveler are given in the listings. Read the rest of this entry »

UK ebay member tobyjug2009 has a habit of buying fake flash drives on ebay from known fraudsters like upcomingtrend and intertrade-connection (see a selection above) and selling them again at a profit.

This has the effect of giving the Chinese fraud gangs positive feedback thus assisting them in their continuing fraudulent activities. It also means that tobyjug2009’s buyers pay more for the fakes that will eventually corrupt their data than they would if they bought direct from the Chinese fraud gangs.

As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

If the flash drives listed by usb_trader are genuine why is the seller hiding behind private auctions? We strongly suspect that it is because they are fake capacity drives which will cause file loss and corruption.

As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

Ebay member scotty_vhs was warned by at least two other kind ebayers that these were not faulty but counterfeit. At least one of the ebayers pointed out that selling these was illegal and gave the seller advice about getting a refund from the supplier. It seems neither of these members got any response from scotty_vhs.

Apparently scotty_vhs is a rather selfish person whose only concern is trying to get some of the money outlaid on these back and hang the consequences for anyone else. As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

UK seller gdlowe1 apparently chose to ignore the ebay member who kindly informed the seller that this flash drive is fake. Instead gdlowe1 seems to have blithely continued with the listings. The fact that sales of these are private makes us suspect that the seller was already aware they were fake.

If you find you bought a counterfeit (brand name fake) like this one it will have a true capaity much smaller than advertised. Such drives are both counterfeit and fake capacity. Most generic (unbranded) flash drives on ebay are also fake capacity. Generic flash drives with fake capacities are not counterfeit (as the term counterfeit applies to brand name items) but if the capacity is fake then they are fraudulent items.

Both counterfeiting (a very specific type of fraud involving use of brand names) and general fraud (such as selling fake capacity generic flash memory) are criminal activities – and ebay seems to take little action about the criminal activity on their site. The frankenflash project are collecting evidence about both types of fraud on ebay.

As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device. This way we have your evidence on record! Sellers and ebay cannot wiggle away from the hard evidence we gather. Be sure to leave a negative comment for the seller and claim a FULL (not partial) refund through the ebay/paypal dispute centre if you find yourself with fake capacity memory items.

It seems that powerprogress (an ebay member registered in Ireland on 8th January 2009) may have a little difficulty in distinguishing between a*** and elbow. This ebay member seems to think that a profit can easily be be made by buying things on ebay and reselling them to other ebay members.

For those who know what they are doing (and are specialists in a particular area such as Art Deco china, Designer jewellery, antiqarian books etc) this can sometimes be the case. However, without the required expertise, an ebay member is at the mercy of the seller’s description.

It seems that powerprogress is somewhat clueless and buys things to resell without any real underlying knowlege of the items purchased and resold. This member bought two patently fake flash drives (both the fraudsters’ favourite) from known fraudsters and has listed one (see listing above) for sale – we expect the other to follow shortly, if not already listed.

This ebay member has also listed “gold coins” purchased on ebay for sale – we are not experts on gold coins (though we do know a lot about flash memory!) and we suspect that powerprogress knows no more than us about the gold coins being resold. What we can say is that some of them are more likely to be gold plated (rather than actually being gold) given the prices paid.

One of the frankenflash project members has made jewellery items on and off for many years and was considering using gold plated coins for a new line of inexpensive jewellery, so we do know that you can gold plate things relatively inexpensively!

We suspect most of the the gold coins being resold by powerprogress could well be as fake as the flash drive in the listing above – but at least a fake gold coin doesn’t destoy anything. Fake flash memory does!!

The unlucky buyer of the item shown above will end up with lost and corrupted data (far worse than losing a few quid) unless the buyer learns it is fake capacity in time to test with h2testw before saving anything to it. The seller was contacted by a concerned ebay member but refused to beleive it could be fake.

For goodness sake folks – do your research before buying or selling on ebay!!

As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

We have our doubts about this 32GB Kingston DataTraveler 200 being genuine. There are a number of reasons for this. This ebay member has no feedback as a seller and is using a private listing to sell these – often a sign of fraud when selling flash memory.

If deals_4_u_2009 was an authorised re-seller then this seller would have got them directly from Kingston. In that case (as Kingston has stringent quality control procedures) why would the seller feel the need to open the package to check they are working? The seller states in the listing:

This Item has been opened for testing purposes to make sure it’s fully working.

Obviously deals_4_u_2009 is not an authorised re-seller supplied directly by Kingston, then. So how is it that deals_4_u_2009 can offer these at a lower price than any authorised re-seller we can find? We can only think of one answer. We expect you can all guess what we think!

Buyers should be able to check the serial number with Kingston (unless of course there isn’t one) to ensure that high capacity Kingston flash drives are genuine. We have a feeling…

The words not, touch and bargepole seem to be in my mind at this moment – but of course the team could be wrong. We do have unfounded suspicions once in a blue moon – but these cases have always turned out to be old stock with out of date software, which can’t be the case here.

Seller hababou1275, registered on ebay France, has sold many of these 32GB memory sticks in private auctions on ebay. If they were genuine the seller would be hugely out of pocket as he or she would have made a loss on almost every sale.

As the seller is still listing in private auctions with a low start price we can only conclude that these are fake capacity items purchase from a fraudulent wholesaler. After all – would you keep selling things if you were losing money on every single sale? No? We don’t think hababou1275 would either – therefore they must have been purchased at a price so low that it is impossible for them to be genuine.

As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

We have news for UK ebay seller rawlogistics2009. It is simply not possible to buy genuine 16GB USB flash drives at a price that would allow you to sell it on ebay with free P&P. What you are selling here simply has to be fake fake fakity fake. Of course the seller could already know this; the tiny picture makes us wonder…

Anyone who buys one will end up with lost and corrupted files. We strongly suggest that rawlogistics2009 remove these from sale, tests them with h2testw and refunds any poor soul that has been daft enough to buy one if (as we expect) they fail this test.

If you choose not to follow this advice then you are likely to end up with negative feedback and an ebay suspension. As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

Here we have a baby gremlin (new fraudster ID selling only one type of flash drive) based in Hong Kong. This seller is listing the fraudsters’ favourite flash drive – easy to program to any capacity they like!

As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

In May we published this about Hong Kong seller mr.sixty7_onlineshop:

Hong Kong based ebay seller mr.sixty7_onlineshop (an ebay member for the past month) is selling a 64GB Kingston flash drive that we think is fake capacity and counterfeit – the picture used by the seller has two tell-tale signs. One of them is that there is no engraving on the metal part in the seller’s picture, while the real ones do have engraving. Can you spot the other difference between the two drives pictured?

If you bought a 64GB Kingston on ebay check that the metal part is engraved. If not, then it isn’t the real deal.

Having got away with fake flash sales before the seller is now back after a three month absence with the the same counterfeit 64GB DataTraveler 150 (but a new picture).

There is also a listing for counterfeit 32GB Kingston DataTraveler 150 drives and for the 8GB flash drive shown on the left. All of these will be fake capacity causing file corruption and data loss for users.

The Kingston drives should have individual serial numbers that can be used to verify genuine drives with Kingston. If there are serial numbers on these Kingston will be unable to verify the drives (fraudsters often get hold of one genuine drive and use the same serial number on all their counterfeits).

The 8GB one can be tested with h2testw reasonably quickly – it is likely to have a true capacity of less than 2GB.

As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

We were rather surprised to see a UK business seller with powerseller status listing these cards with a 99p start price with free p&p. Seller sultech only has one negative. Close examination of the seller’s feedback comments shows that the answer to our question about whether these are genuine is a clear no!

We think listing these as used is a ploy to lull buyers into a false sense of security as people do sometimes list genuiine slightly used memory items with a 99p start. Such listings are normally for items of 2GB or lower, however – and not with free postage! We suspect this could be deliberate fraud.

There are quite a number of comments about fakes in both positive and neutral feedback. The fact that refunded buyers are not leaving negative feedback allows this seller to continue defrauding ebay members.

Please, folks – when you buy fake items leave a negative both as a clear warning to others and to help ebay remove fraudsters from the site!!

As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

Here we have (yet again) the fraudsters’ favourite flash drive. Most of the fraudsters operating out of China sell this model – the oldest fake capacity flash drive.

Why is this model so popular with fraudsters? It is easy to reprogram to any fake capacity they like and looks very attractive to buyers! A winning combination for any fraudster. We are sure that flash memory items from seller taniangdi099 will prove to be fake capacity.

As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

We think that i.babecare is a new ID set up by fraudsters in Hong Kong for the purpose of selling flash memory items. We are fairly certain that this flash drive will prove to be fake capacity. As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

We fully expect this 16GB flash drive listed by new ebay seller jixin099 to be counterfeit and fake capacity. It is simply not possible to sell a genuine one this cheaply. As always we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

Any flash drive you see in this packaging is fake capacity and will cause data loss and corruption.

In the listing seller eagamesking says:

32Gb capacity micro Cruzer USB drive for ONLY $59.95 with free postage. Item is exactly as in the photo.

This product IS NOT made by Sundisk. Please do not be fooled by sellers from Hong Kong, China even some Australian sellers who claim they are selling genuine Sundisk. TRUST US we know how to spot a fake & every single one on eBay is fake.

Our product IS NOT A REPLICA, no where on it does it say SunDisk or any claims that it is made by SunDisk.

What we are offering is a reliable & fast USB 2.0 32GB capacity flash drive with 12 months AUSTRALIAN WARRANTY directly from us, we will exchange it for you straight away.

This product is compatible with Windows XP, Vista & upcoming 7, also Linux & Mac OS.

We also offer 30 day money back warranty if you are not 100 satisfied with your purchase.

We are Australian based store, all items are in stock & dispatched from Sydney.

If (as claimed here) the seller knows how to spot a fake then this listing is deliberate fraud as these are fake! We expect any other flash drives from this seller will turn out to be fakes too. As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

We think zengwumin1982 is a new ID for suspended fraudster aaaiphone. We think this flash drive is bound to be fake capacity despite it being priced at what you would expect to pay for a genuine one. As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

We think UK ebay seller express-savings has been shopping in fake flash land. A previous listing for Kingston flash drives which we considered suspect was removed by ebay (presumably at Kingston’s request) – suggesting we were right in our suspicions. The swivel type drives being listed by the seller now also look highly suspect to us, as does the fact that they are being sold in private auctions. We think they will turn out to be fake capacity. Anyone using a false capacity flash drive will eventually suffer data loss and file corruption.

As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

If this drive is genuine then seller jackbauerwouldnttakethis seems to have made a loss on the transaction. The use of a private auction makes us suspect that it could be a counterfeit. As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

We consider any flash drive sold in a private auction on ebay suspect. In our experience when sellers use private auctions to list flash memory items it is because they are not genuine. We suspect that this 16GB DataTraveler 100 listed by sabrina.alireza could be counterfeit.

As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

Seller babieblackcat seems to be using dropshipping here. As these are shipped from Hong Kong we strongly suspect they will turn out to be counterfeit and fake capacity.

It seems from examining this seller’s history that this would not be the first time this seller supplied counterfeits.

We strongly advise buyers to check serial numbers with Kingston. We think they will probably say they are likely to be counterfeit.

If they are counterfeit they will also be fake capacity and cause data loss for users.

The true capacity of the drive can be discovered by testing with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

This is the fraudsters’ favourite flash drive – easily programmed to any fake capacity. Seller ebidetrade001 also offers a stainless steel model. This seller started by selling a large quantity of styluses at a loss – a familiar strategy for building up feedback – before listing flash drives that we are certain are fake capacity. The fact that buyer IDs are hidden is very suspect.

As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

An ebay member sent a message to hishatcha yesterday warning that this item is counterfeit and fake capacity. The seller has not replied or removed the listing. This makes us wonder if (rather than being an innocent victim of a fraudulent supplier) hishatcha is commiting deliberate fraud.

As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

Looks like we have another carefully set up ID from one of our favourite flash fraud gangs in China here. None of the feedback at the time we noticed this was for flash memory. Seems that the mememao9898 ID was set up using a familiar pattern. Sellers build a defensive wall of positive feedback by selling cheap items (often at a loss) to delay the inevitable suspension when buyers start to find out that the flash memory items from the seller are fake capacity.

As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

UPDATE 09/10/09
This fraudster has now changed ID to 123456wowo123456 – obviously hoping to slip under the radar!

Has seller shaven_haven been buying counterfeit (and therefore fake capacity) flash memory items from other ebay sellers and re-selling them? The seller certainly doesn’t seem to be buying flash memory items wholesale. All flash memory items such as this 32GB Kingston DataTraveler USB flash drive, other flash drives and memory cards sold before seem to be single items.

We are curious about this seller’s location. We don’t remember seeing a city, town or village anywhere in the UK called Here & There! – perhaps someone would like to enlighten us?? Our suspicions about this seller are further aroused by the use of private auctions and the low start prices.

Without spending the time to investigate shaven_haven thouroughly we cannot say for sure where the seller got these flash memory items but we are fairly certain they are counterfeits which will cause file corruption and data loss for anyone using them.

As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

Seller ehsanshk says in the listing for this item:

Hi, here i have an Unwanted Gift bought from PC World for £169.99, if you don’t believe then go to PC WORLD website and see the price yourself. the Stick has never been used and its brand new but unfortunately the packaging has been opened so you will only get the stick if you win the auction

Hmm – if it was an unwanted gift why take it out of the packaging? And how does it come to pass that this seller has previously sold other flash drives that are unused but have been taken out of the packaging? These were:

a very nice, stylish, brand new and genuine 16gb usb /memory stick from Integral, it has never been used, comes with no pakcaging, BRAND NEW, this is £39.99 bought brand new

Which sold for £11.63

a very nice, stylish, brand new and genuine 16gb EMTEC usb stick, has never been used, comes with no pakcaging, BRAND NEW, this is £39.99 bought brand new

This sold for £11.01

a brand new 64gb Integral Usb memory stick , this is the highest you can get, was bought from Pcworld for £139.99,you can check yourself ! the receipt is lost and i can not get a refund from the store , the stick has never been used, its a genuine 64gb unlike some chinies and fake ones. The stick has been taken out of its box

which sold for £60.23

Does ehsanshk have a rich relative or friend who keeps buying these as unwanted gifts? Why does ehsanshk keep taking unwanted items out of their packaging? Why does ehsanshk never have a receipt to get a refund? If they were all presents why doesn’t ehsanshk tell people not to buy flash drives as presents?

Does ehsanshk live in Grimsby? Aberdeen? No – the seller lives in Birmingham – nowhere near the sea. We are puzzled about the smell of fish. Maybe ehsanshk would like to invite a member of the frankenflash project who lives in Birmingham to examine the drive and ask a few questions – along with a few members of the West Midlands police. We are sure that our Birmingham-based project member will happily visit ehsanshk with the police if this seller would care to provide his or her address.

We can’t see how jojodavison could possibly be selling be selling genuine 32GB DataTraveler 100 flash drives at this price. We strongly suspect that these were purchased from one of the many fraudulent wholesalers in China who sell counterfeits. Counterfeit also means fake capacity and data loss. Buyers should check the serial number with Kingston.

As usual we strongly advise ebayers (both sellers and buyers) to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw or, in the case high capacity items from well – known brands, check the serial numbers with the manufacturer.

If you buy one of these direct from Sandisk it will cost around £100. Research indicates there is not a very large profit margin on flash drives. We don’t think fasttracksss could buy genuine ones wholesale at a price that would allow them to be resold at half the price the manufacturer charges. We think these came from a fraudulent supplier. Feedback indicates that seller is not exactly the most reliable on ebay so we doubt very much that fasttracksss has checked with Sandisk to ensure that the drives are genuine. We doubt if the seller has bothered to test with h2testw either.

As usual we strongly advise ebayers (both sellers and buyers) to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

We think this flash drive is a bit on the cheap side – either it’s a bargain or it’s counterfeit. We suggest that takavar1 contact Kingston and check the serial numbers of the drives with them to ensure he or she is not breaking the law by selling counterfeit items.

Seems from feedback that seller greatprice* doesn’t just use private sales to sell what we are sure are counterfeit Kingston DataTraveler 150 drives but also for a sim card scam (selling cards you can get for free) – seems like a proper fraudster type to us. Serial numbers can be checked with Kingston to find out whether or not this type of flash drive is genuine. You can test to discover the true capacity with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

We consider this listing by allsorts20009 highly suspect.

This is for several reasons:

You can’t see the flash drive properly

The price seems far to low for it to be a genuine 64GB flash drive

Buyer IDs are hidden.

This seller previously sold Kingston DataTraveler 150 drives in 64GB and 32GB capacities at what we think are impossibly low prices.

The fact that Kingston drives were sold at low prices makes the seller highly suspect in our eyes – we think all his items wil prove to be fake capacity and the Kingstons will also be counterfeit. It could just be that this seller has been foolish and did not check items out before listing – if so we expect to hear from refunded buyers!

As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

Seller gtretail sold a number of flash drives using the picture on the left. They were listed as 16GB, 32GB and 64GB. Genuine drives like this which are orange coloured come in only one capacity 32GB. The 64GB is red and there are no 16GB drives of this model. We think these came from a fraudulent supplier and are counterfeits. As the seller kept buyer IDs private we suspect that gtretail may be aware of this.

The true capacity can be discovered with the small free program h2testw

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

This listing from darko_sport looks highly suspect to us – we doubt very much if these are genuine and we don’t think the serial numbers will check out with Kingston.

This seller in the USA has listed a number of 16GB Sandisk flash drives at auction with a start price of 1 cent. If the flash drives offered by simgen are genuine the seller is risking a loss on every drive as bid prices for flash drives are artificially low. The reason for this is all the cheap fake capacity drives available at prices you could never get a genuine flash drive for. This makes us wonder whether this will turn out to yet another counterfeit. As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.

We consider it highly unlikely that the flash drives listed by markb191073 are genuine. We think a quick check of the serial numbers with Kingston would reveal these are counterfeit.

The picture in this listing does not show genuine 128GB flash drives – there are only three models of 128GB flash drive made at present – and the one from Kingston looks nothing like this. The seller says in the listing:

I have various styles of Flash Drives and the one you receive may not look like the one in the picture. The ” flip type” seems to be vary popular ( probably because you can’t loose the cap ) and I do get more of them than any other style. I buy in bulk so the ones I have in stock are the ones I will be shipping.

There are no genuine “flip type” 128Gb flash drives from any manufacturer – so any of this type sent out by the seller will be fake capacity. We suspect that koopnhoop is buying in bulk from one of the many fraudulent wholesalers selling fake capacity memory. We are absolutely certain that testing with h2testw will reveal that the seller’s flash drives have a capacity considerably less than 128GB.

As usual we strongly advise ebayers to test all flash memory with the free program h2testw.

Report in to SOSFakeFlash if your testing confirms you have a false capacity device.