$200 iTunes Gift Cards on Sale for $2.60 (Ok, Not Really…)
Ok, well Apple is really not selling $200 iTunes gift cards for only $2.60 so keep dreaming. But according to Music Ally Chinese “pirates” have hacked the algorithm that generates the iTunes gift cards and so now fake cards are flooding the market for as low as $2.60 in China. When we say flooding we literally mean flooding the Chinese market:
Apparently six months ago, a $200 card went for around 320 RMB (roughly $47), but the price has since plummeted to around 18 RMB ($2.60) as more sellers pile in.
With the iPhone 3G getting ready to make an appearance in China it should be interesting to see just how Apple responds to this. Apple will more than likely make a quick change to nullify the pirates ability to create these cards but it’s not like you can do away with the ones already in circulation as there is no easy way to decipher a bogus card from one that is legit (unless they have some super secret Apple wonder-ETL and ad-hoc query/number-crunching monster we don’t know about).
[Via Music Ally]
March 10th, 2009 at 5:29 pm
Where do I get one?
March 10th, 2009 at 7:10 pm
@sting7k – My exact thought when I read it!
March 10th, 2009 at 7:56 pm
gizmodo has a link… i just wish i could trust the Chinese with my credit card..
Okay wow giz’z story just dissapeared i guess. lemme check my history for the link…
http://item.taobao.com/auction/item_detail-0db2-e6f89b244068b317ea67388baed18905.jhtml?pm1=3
I guess get a pre-paid card and do it that way
March 12th, 2009 at 1:11 am
Check out discountitunes.webs.com and pay through paypal.com
March 13th, 2009 at 12:06 am
LOL@ Mac Tunes for referral based scheme. $100 for a $200 card? Nah, I’ll go with the Chinese, thanks.
March 14th, 2009 at 1:50 pm
If it’s a case of stolen credit cards rather than cracked, it’s likely been happening for many months, as I noted here: http://www.wisebread.com/inside-the-shady-world-of-cheap-itunes-gift-cards
March 19th, 2009 at 4:34 pm
So how do I buy one? I cannot understand chinese at all so I can’t use taobao… And discount.itunes@rocketmail.com is pretty expensive considering…