ADAM ENGST 19 May 2026

At New Hampshire Public Radio, Todd Bookman writes:

New Hampshire appears to be the epicenter of a global criminal operation involving stolen gift cards, rented warehouses, and millions of dollars’ worth of Apple products, authorities say.

The scale of the scheme is mind-boggling: Apple, working with police, determined that the company shipped 46,364 products to a single warehouse in Windham, New Hampshire during a 10-week window last summer, with a total value of $47 million. That works out to an average of $600,000 a day in Apple products to a single location. A separate facility in Amherst received another $35 million in iPhones over the same period.

At what point does Apple stop offering gift cards because they enable too much harm?

Bookman’s dramatic story provides yet another reason to avoid physical gift cards. Thieves steal gift cards from retail store shelves, extract the card numbers and PINs, then return the cards to the racks. When an unsuspecting customer later buys and loads money onto the card, the thieves—monitoring remotely—immediately drain the funds and use them to purchase Apple products. Those products ship to warehouses in New Hampshire (chosen for its lack of sales tax), where workers repackage them for export overseas. It’s brilliantly evil.

The consequences for individuals who unknowingly purchase the tampered cards can also be severe. As I covered in “Compromised Apple Gift Card Saga Ends Well, but Risks Remain” (18 December 2025), attempting to redeem a compromised card can trigger Apple’s fraud-detection systems and lock you out of your Apple Account. My recommendation stands: avoid physical gift cards entirely, and if you must use one, redeem it at an Apple Store for physical merchandise rather than adding the balance to your Apple Account.

Read original article