iPhone Theft Scams and Apple's Anti-Theft Measures Under Scrutiny

Infoblox Threat Intel researchers have documented a sophisticated scam network targeting stolen iPhone owners, where criminals use fake Apple-branded websites, smishing texts, and Telegram-based tools to extract passcodes and unlock stolen devices for resale. The scams are highly personalized, leveraging information from the stolen phone itself (owner name, email, device details) and arriving immediately after theft to create urgency. Unlocking services are commoditized and affordable, costing between $5 and $50, making phone theft profitable even for criminals without technical expertise. Researchers identified over 10,000 domains associated with these campaigns. In parallel, the UK's Met Police report significant progress in combating phone theft through partnership with Apple, citing an 18% reduction in stolen phones in London year-over-year. Apple's Stolen Device Protection feature, now enabled by default in iOS 26.4, introduces delays before passwords can be changed when a phone is outside familiar locations, giving owners time to mark devices as lost. The Met Police also indicate that Apple has solved the engineering problem that previously allowed factory resets of stolen devices using illicit software, though specific technical details remain unclear.