7 ms·

Just received 2 cheapo 64GB micro sd cards from aliexpress, they seemed legit, had tons of reviews with OK crystaldisk performance screenshots and... they're ju

Just received 2 cheapo 64GB micro sd cards from aliexpress, they seemed legit, had tons of reviews with OK crystaldisk performance screenshots and... they're junk This tool quickly identified that they were counterfeit of type "Limbo", with 16GB of capacity instead of 64GB. Thanks to Michel Machado for writing this gem.

tombert 2y ago
A part of me will see stuff like "3TB Flash Drive" on AliExpress for $3 and briefly consider buying it. Like, I know it's obviously not true, it's obviously a lie, but I also am curious about what I would actually get. I never do it because I don't really see the point of paying money for something that will immediately go into a landfill, but it's always tempting.
- bombcar 2y ago
  Back when it was being done with external hard drives there were YouTube channels dedicated to breaking them open and experimenting with how they did it. Fun stuff to watch on a boring afternoon.
- jayrot 2y ago
  The potpourri of a youtube channel, Atomic Shrimp, has done a couple interesting videos doing just that.
  - pogue 2y ago
    His channel is where I first heard of this scam. https://youtube.com/watch?v=UsWx1iO-aeA https://youtube.com/watch?v=UsWx1iO-aeA
- megous 2y ago
  For consumer stuff like this, you'll obviously get something else. But sometimes you can get recycled components if the price obviously is not sane, where recycling is an option. It's only fraud if the description mentions new and original. :)
  - tombert 2y ago
    My trick to get decently priced computer equipment is to buy used stuff from data centers; generally that stuff will sell for pennies because their goal is to "get rid of it", not "get rid of it for a profit". Desktop network cards and switches are almost always available for very little (sometimes literally just $1 + shipping).
    - SoftTalker 2y ago
      Look at govdeals.com for stuff from universities, they seem to sell a lot of their surplus hardware there.
      - tombert 2y ago
        Govdeals is sort of addictive. I've only bought stuff on there a few times, but it's fun to look around and see stuff like "pallet of 400 laptops" selling for $600.
    - callalex 2y ago
      How do you find such things? In person or online somewhere?
      - tombert 2y ago
        Sibling comment mentioned Govdeals, which is a place I'll look sometimes if I can find something near me or they're willing to ship. You can look on Craigslist as well, especially if you live in a large metro area (I live in NYC so it's easy to find lots of corporate surplus). Companies will often need to upgrade all their infra and liquidate their equipment. My printer is a giant nearly 20 year old HP office thing that I got for $30 + $100 for the Uber back home from an office that did a full IT renewal.
    - pogue 2y ago
      When you say data centers, what do you mean? If I was looking on Craigslist or whatever for this, how would I be able to tell which seller is a data center?
- axiolite 2y ago
  A few sellers on eBay are honest Description: This item is upgraded by 32 GB Pen Flash Drive to 2TB 32GB-2TB, the actual capacity is 32G, the computer displays 2TB, the detection is also 2TB, more than 32G things can be stored, but not displayed. https://www.ebay.com/itm/234810575961 That's not bad. Most counterfeits I get are just 2GB so hardly useful. Still, the counterfeit firmware makes compatibility issues more likely, so better to buy one without the counterfeiting.
  - p51-remorse 2y ago
    Is there any reason I would deliberately purchase one of these over a standard 32GB drive? Trying to think of if there’s a case where I would want to trick some hardware into thinking it has a 2TB drive when it really doesn’t?
    - floam 2y ago
      btrfs unable to accommodate further writes but not logically full, needs more space to start deleting stuff. YOLO
  - dns_snek 2y ago
    > more than 32G things can be stored, but not displayed. That's certainly an interesting way to phrase it. I use /dev/null for a similar purpose with the added benefit that it can store petabytes of data, but sadly we don't have the technology to display it yet.
    - betagammaxyz 2y ago
      Lol. That's up there with the [1-bit Bloom filter](https://www.xkcd.com/2934/ https://www.xkcd.com/2934/)
  - KomoD 2y ago
    But why would anyone want a fake 2TB though? Surely they write this to cover their ass when people don't read the entire listing.
- gosub100 2y ago
  I did this on Amazon knowing it was a scam and immediately returned it just to drive up their numbers and hopefully get them shut down faster. I have no idea if that did any good, but what disappointed me was Amazon only gave me credit, not a full refund.
  - megous 2y ago
    Yeah, aliexpress returns real money.
- mavamaarten 2y ago
  And there's honest stuff on there too, loads of it actually. I bought a 128GB SSD from there many years ago for $10. I expected nothing but like you say, I was curious about what I'd get and something faster than a shitty USB stick with decent storage capacity was all I was after. I verified it, and it works perfectly and it's 128GB as described, it just lacks cache so it bogs down on super large files. But for $10 I couldn't buy a better USB stick.
  - userbinator 2y ago
    They may have true capacity but long-term retention is yet to be established: https://htwingnut.com/2022/09/11/ssd-as-long-term-storage-testing/ https://htwingnut.com/2022/09/11/ssd-as-long-term-storage-te... There's even SLC USB drives being advertised, an otherwise extremely overpriced item these days, with sellers posting the exact part numbers and pictures of the insides as evidence. Those may be using recycled flash.
  - tombert 2y ago
    A few years ago Micro Center had a coupon for a free 120gb SSD, which I guess worked because I ended up going there and buying stuff in order to redeem it. The SSD wasn't great, it was pretty slow, but it did work, and I have used it in conjunction with a USB SATA adapter as something where I can write lots and lots of tiny files for projects I work on [1], and where I don't particularly care if I break it. Surprisingly, it's still holding up...pretty good for free! [1] One project I've done involves breaking up video files into a picture of every frame, then do some kind of image processing, write the new files, and then glue them back together, which means there can be a ton of writes on there that I don't want to be done on the expensive and irreplaceable internal SSD on my Mac.
- userbinator 2y ago
  https://www.trendforce.com/price/flash https://www.trendforce.com/price/flash TLC flash is currently less than $0.10/GB. $3 will probably get you a 32GB drive with flash of dubious quality.
onemoresoop 2y ago
This tool could save you from corrupting data but once you buy these counterfeit cards you're better off trashing them than requesting a refund, shipping will cost you more that the drive itself.
- globalise83 2y ago
  Chargeback - goods not as described. No need to return them.
  - dylan604 2y ago
    Supposedly, card processors are meant to suspend accounts when they get too many chargebacks. How is that number determined? If it's a percentage of total charges, then places like Amazon/Ali* will have so many other charges these will pretty much round to zero. Also, these vendors are "too big to suspend", so chargebacks will do nothing like what they are meant to.
    - mynameisvlad 2y ago
      What do you mean they don’t do what they’re supposed to? They get you your money back. That’s what they’re supposed to do. Dropping the merchant is a bonus.
      - dylan604 2y ago
        The chargeback is meant as last resort though when a company is not cooperating. The company has already been refunding without having to do a chargeback. The chargeback is meant to let the processor know that their customer isn't holding up their end of the agreement.
        mynameisvlad 2y ago
        You're correct that it's a last resort, but its primary role is to, literally, charge back to the original merchant. "[letting] the processor know that their customer isn't holding up to their end of the agreement" is a side benefit. As is eventually dropping the merchant when there are too many chargebacks to justify supporting them. > Through a chargeback, your bank can try to get your money back from the seller on your behalf it isn’t a legal right, but your bank is committed to helping you, and will treat any claim fairly. https://www.visa.co.uk/how-you-pay-matters/chargeback-purchase-disputes.html https://www.visa.co.uk/how-you-pay-matters/chargeback-purcha... > When a customer disputes a debit or credit card transaction, the card issuer must determine whether to provide that cardholder with a refund for the transaction amount—also known as a chargeback. https://b2b.mastercard.com/news-and-insights/blog/what-is-a-chargeback/ https://b2b.mastercard.com/news-and-insights/blog/what-is-a-... > A chargeback is a rules-based mechanism, with time-sensitive workflows, that enables the issuer and the acquirer to determine the financial liability of a disputed transaction. https://www.mastercard.us/content/dam/public/mastercardcom/na/global-site/documents/chargebacks-made-simple-guide.pdf https://www.mastercard.us/content/dam/public/mastercardcom/n... > A chargeback occurs when, after investigation of the dispute, we debit your account for the amount of the disputed transaction and credit the Card Member with this amount. https://www.americanexpress.com/au/merchant/chargebacks-and-fraud0.html https://www.americanexpress.com/au/merchant/chargebacks-and-... Notice none of them talk about it being a feedback mechanism. Because it's not. It's a refund mechanism used as a last resort.
ableal 2y ago
> had tons of reviews with OK crystaldisk performance screenshots Select the 1-star reviews. Usually someone helpfully posts proof of the scam.
- gosub100 2y ago
  Until a new scammer runs a protection racket offering to withhold the scam accusation for a price.
toast0 2y ago
I've bought a couple things from Aliexpress, and payment processing is such a hassle[1], I don't know why you would use it to buy things that are easily found from domestic sources? Especially SD cards which are widely counterfeited. [1] This was a couple years ago, maybe things got streamlined? Of my cards that don't have a foreign transaction fee, Aliexpress wants the phone number off the back of one, which is sketchy; no thanks. The second one, charges don't go through, and the issuer customer service can't even see the attempts; I have to ask them to disable security on my card for ~ 30 minutes, and then the charges go through. Billing showed from England, IIRC. Doesn't (edit: Didn't! thanks) support any intermediates I do (paypal/amazon pay) which is usually my goto for low trust transactions.
- gambiting 2y ago
  They do support PayPal nowadays. Paying on AliExpress is as easy as on Amazon, and a lot of things do have a 5 day delivery guarantee and it does actually work. I've been using it quite a lot personally(I'm in the UK).
- akvadrako 2y ago
  That sounds like issues with your bank, not AliExpress. I entered my card number with them years ago and it just works. What I hate is their login and search - both horribly broken. But as to why, it's a better selection than Amazon for many things (for example components) and usually cheaper.
KomoD 2y ago
Wow, they scam for that little of a price difference? 64GB costs almost nothing...
- Zancarius 2y ago
  Yeah, really... I picked up a 128GiB card from the store on something of a whim a while back, and I'm not even sure I paid more than about $18USD (with tax) for it. I bet I could have gotten it cheaper, but I was impatient.
pogue 2y ago
A helpful tool I recommend for buying from common outlets online is Fakespot [1]. It scans the reviews and looks for suspicious/fake reviews & other telltale signs of deceit. Mozilla recently acquired it, but you can scan Amazon URLs on their website, and they have a very helpful browser addon. There was a similar tool I used to double check called ReviewMeta, but they seem to be offline. It's not a 100% foolproof way to determine if a vendor or product is fake, but it is helpful. There are some other things you can do to double check things as well. [2] [1] https://www.fakespot.com/ https://www.fakespot.com/ [2] https://www.wired.com/story/how-to-spot-fake-reviews-amazon/ https://www.wired.com/story/how-to-spot-fake-reviews-amazon/
- declan_roberts 2y ago
  Every single product on Amazon has a fake spot of like D these days. They flooded the field.

tombert 2y ago

A part of me will see stuff like "3TB Flash Drive" on AliExpress for $3 and briefly consider buying it. Like, I know it's obviously not true, it's obviously a lie, but I also am curious about what I would actually get. I never do it because I don't really see the point of paying money for something that will immediately go into a landfill, but it's always tempting.

bombcar 2y ago
Back when it was being done with external hard drives there were YouTube channels dedicated to breaking them open and experimenting with how they did it. Fun stuff to watch on a boring afternoon.
jayrot 2y ago
The potpourri of a youtube channel, Atomic Shrimp, has done a couple interesting videos doing just that.
- pogue 2y ago
  His channel is where I first heard of this scam. https://youtube.com/watch?v=UsWx1iO-aeA https://youtube.com/watch?v=UsWx1iO-aeA
megous 2y ago
For consumer stuff like this, you'll obviously get something else. But sometimes you can get recycled components if the price obviously is not sane, where recycling is an option. It's only fraud if the description mentions new and original. :)
- tombert 2y ago
  My trick to get decently priced computer equipment is to buy used stuff from data centers; generally that stuff will sell for pennies because their goal is to "get rid of it", not "get rid of it for a profit". Desktop network cards and switches are almost always available for very little (sometimes literally just $1 + shipping).
  - SoftTalker 2y ago
    Look at govdeals.com for stuff from universities, they seem to sell a lot of their surplus hardware there.
    - tombert 2y ago
      Govdeals is sort of addictive. I've only bought stuff on there a few times, but it's fun to look around and see stuff like "pallet of 400 laptops" selling for $600.
  - callalex 2y ago
    How do you find such things? In person or online somewhere?
    - tombert 2y ago
      Sibling comment mentioned Govdeals, which is a place I'll look sometimes if I can find something near me or they're willing to ship. You can look on Craigslist as well, especially if you live in a large metro area (I live in NYC so it's easy to find lots of corporate surplus). Companies will often need to upgrade all their infra and liquidate their equipment. My printer is a giant nearly 20 year old HP office thing that I got for $30 + $100 for the Uber back home from an office that did a full IT renewal.
  - pogue 2y ago
    When you say data centers, what do you mean? If I was looking on Craigslist or whatever for this, how would I be able to tell which seller is a data center?
axiolite 2y ago
A few sellers on eBay are honest Description: This item is upgraded by 32 GB Pen Flash Drive to 2TB 32GB-2TB, the actual capacity is 32G, the computer displays 2TB, the detection is also 2TB, more than 32G things can be stored, but not displayed. https://www.ebay.com/itm/234810575961 That's not bad. Most counterfeits I get are just 2GB so hardly useful. Still, the counterfeit firmware makes compatibility issues more likely, so better to buy one without the counterfeiting.
- p51-remorse 2y ago
  Is there any reason I would deliberately purchase one of these over a standard 32GB drive? Trying to think of if there’s a case where I would want to trick some hardware into thinking it has a 2TB drive when it really doesn’t?
  - floam 2y ago
    btrfs unable to accommodate further writes but not logically full, needs more space to start deleting stuff. YOLO
- dns_snek 2y ago
  > more than 32G things can be stored, but not displayed. That's certainly an interesting way to phrase it. I use /dev/null for a similar purpose with the added benefit that it can store petabytes of data, but sadly we don't have the technology to display it yet.
  - betagammaxyz 2y ago
    Lol. That's up there with the [1-bit Bloom filter](https://www.xkcd.com/2934/ https://www.xkcd.com/2934/)
- KomoD 2y ago
  But why would anyone want a fake 2TB though? Surely they write this to cover their ass when people don't read the entire listing.
gosub100 2y ago
I did this on Amazon knowing it was a scam and immediately returned it just to drive up their numbers and hopefully get them shut down faster. I have no idea if that did any good, but what disappointed me was Amazon only gave me credit, not a full refund.
- megous 2y ago
  Yeah, aliexpress returns real money.
mavamaarten 2y ago
And there's honest stuff on there too, loads of it actually. I bought a 128GB SSD from there many years ago for $10. I expected nothing but like you say, I was curious about what I'd get and something faster than a shitty USB stick with decent storage capacity was all I was after. I verified it, and it works perfectly and it's 128GB as described, it just lacks cache so it bogs down on super large files. But for $10 I couldn't buy a better USB stick.
- userbinator 2y ago
  They may have true capacity but long-term retention is yet to be established: https://htwingnut.com/2022/09/11/ssd-as-long-term-storage-testing/ https://htwingnut.com/2022/09/11/ssd-as-long-term-storage-te... There's even SLC USB drives being advertised, an otherwise extremely overpriced item these days, with sellers posting the exact part numbers and pictures of the insides as evidence. Those may be using recycled flash.
- tombert 2y ago
  A few years ago Micro Center had a coupon for a free 120gb SSD, which I guess worked because I ended up going there and buying stuff in order to redeem it. The SSD wasn't great, it was pretty slow, but it did work, and I have used it in conjunction with a USB SATA adapter as something where I can write lots and lots of tiny files for projects I work on [1], and where I don't particularly care if I break it. Surprisingly, it's still holding up...pretty good for free! [1] One project I've done involves breaking up video files into a picture of every frame, then do some kind of image processing, write the new files, and then glue them back together, which means there can be a ton of writes on there that I don't want to be done on the expensive and irreplaceable internal SSD on my Mac.
userbinator 2y ago
https://www.trendforce.com/price/flash https://www.trendforce.com/price/flash TLC flash is currently less than $0.10/GB. $3 will probably get you a 32GB drive with flash of dubious quality.

onemoresoop 2y ago

This tool could save you from corrupting data but once you buy these counterfeit cards you're better off trashing them than requesting a refund, shipping will cost you more that the drive itself.

globalise83 2y ago
Chargeback - goods not as described. No need to return them.
- dylan604 2y ago
  Supposedly, card processors are meant to suspend accounts when they get too many chargebacks. How is that number determined? If it's a percentage of total charges, then places like Amazon/Ali* will have so many other charges these will pretty much round to zero. Also, these vendors are "too big to suspend", so chargebacks will do nothing like what they are meant to.
  - mynameisvlad 2y ago
    What do you mean they don’t do what they’re supposed to? They get you your money back. That’s what they’re supposed to do. Dropping the merchant is a bonus.
    - dylan604 2y ago
      The chargeback is meant as last resort though when a company is not cooperating. The company has already been refunding without having to do a chargeback. The chargeback is meant to let the processor know that their customer isn't holding up their end of the agreement.
      - mynameisvlad 2y ago
        You're correct that it's a last resort, but its primary role is to, literally, charge back to the original merchant. "[letting] the processor know that their customer isn't holding up to their end of the agreement" is a side benefit. As is eventually dropping the merchant when there are too many chargebacks to justify supporting them. > Through a chargeback, your bank can try to get your money back from the seller on your behalf it isn’t a legal right, but your bank is committed to helping you, and will treat any claim fairly. https://www.visa.co.uk/how-you-pay-matters/chargeback-purchase-disputes.html https://www.visa.co.uk/how-you-pay-matters/chargeback-purcha... > When a customer disputes a debit or credit card transaction, the card issuer must determine whether to provide that cardholder with a refund for the transaction amount—also known as a chargeback. https://b2b.mastercard.com/news-and-insights/blog/what-is-a-chargeback/ https://b2b.mastercard.com/news-and-insights/blog/what-is-a-... > A chargeback is a rules-based mechanism, with time-sensitive workflows, that enables the issuer and the acquirer to determine the financial liability of a disputed transaction. https://www.mastercard.us/content/dam/public/mastercardcom/na/global-site/documents/chargebacks-made-simple-guide.pdf https://www.mastercard.us/content/dam/public/mastercardcom/n... > A chargeback occurs when, after investigation of the dispute, we debit your account for the amount of the disputed transaction and credit the Card Member with this amount. https://www.americanexpress.com/au/merchant/chargebacks-and-fraud0.html https://www.americanexpress.com/au/merchant/chargebacks-and-... Notice none of them talk about it being a feedback mechanism. Because it's not. It's a refund mechanism used as a last resort.

ableal 2y ago

> had tons of reviews with OK crystaldisk performance screenshots Select the 1-star reviews. Usually someone helpfully posts proof of the scam.

gosub100 2y ago
Until a new scammer runs a protection racket offering to withhold the scam accusation for a price.

toast0 2y ago

I've bought a couple things from Aliexpress, and payment processing is such a hassle[1], I don't know why you would use it to buy things that are easily found from domestic sources? Especially SD cards which are widely counterfeited. [1] This was a couple years ago, maybe things got streamlined? Of my cards that don't have a foreign transaction fee, Aliexpress wants the phone number off the back of one, which is sketchy; no thanks. The second one, charges don't go through, and the issuer customer service can't even see the attempts; I have to ask them to disable security on my card for ~ 30 minutes, and then the charges go through. Billing showed from England, IIRC. Doesn't (edit: Didn't! thanks) support any intermediates I do (paypal/amazon pay) which is usually my goto for low trust transactions.

gambiting 2y ago
They do support PayPal nowadays. Paying on AliExpress is as easy as on Amazon, and a lot of things do have a 5 day delivery guarantee and it does actually work. I've been using it quite a lot personally(I'm in the UK).
akvadrako 2y ago
That sounds like issues with your bank, not AliExpress. I entered my card number with them years ago and it just works. What I hate is their login and search - both horribly broken. But as to why, it's a better selection than Amazon for many things (for example components) and usually cheaper.

KomoD 2y ago

Wow, they scam for that little of a price difference? 64GB costs almost nothing...

Zancarius 2y ago
Yeah, really... I picked up a 128GiB card from the store on something of a whim a while back, and I'm not even sure I paid more than about $18USD (with tax) for it. I bet I could have gotten it cheaper, but I was impatient.

pogue 2y ago

A helpful tool I recommend for buying from common outlets online is Fakespot [1]. It scans the reviews and looks for suspicious/fake reviews & other telltale signs of deceit. Mozilla recently acquired it, but you can scan Amazon URLs on their website, and they have a very helpful browser addon. There was a similar tool I used to double check called ReviewMeta, but they seem to be offline. It's not a 100% foolproof way to determine if a vendor or product is fake, but it is helpful. There are some other things you can do to double check things as well. [2] [1] https://www.fakespot.com/ https://www.fakespot.com/ [2] https://www.wired.com/story/how-to-spot-fake-reviews-amazon/ https://www.wired.com/story/how-to-spot-fake-reviews-amazon/

declan_roberts 2y ago
Every single product on Amazon has a fake spot of like D these days. They flooded the field.