As the largest e-commerce platform, Amazon deals with huge number of goods that need to be shipped on an everyday basis.
And here, Amazon caught five employees for allegedly stealing €500,000 worth of iPhones from a logistics center in Madrid, the capital and most-populous city of Spain.
It began when Amazon experienced issues with some packages sent to customers due to having different weights from what they actual orders were expected to weigh. Because this shouldn't happen, Amazon started installing some hidden cameras to find out what was happening.
This was when Amazon caught five of its employees implicated in a theft ring.
They were found slipping new iPhones, including the iPhone 12 and 12 Pro, into orders secretly, replacing the actual ordered contents of a package.
The attempts were done at the last moment to minimize suspicion.
It was reported that the orders were allegedly placed by the five employees' accomplice.
With enough evidence, Amazon reported the incident to the authorities.
Three of the five people implicated in the theft ring were arrested when leaving work, the fourth was picked up while working, and the fifth, knowing that his fellow colleagues were already caught, turned himself in to the police voluntarily.
With the five in custody, Amazon fired them.
Upon investigation, it was found that the workers had ten iPhones in their possession, all of which were intended to be smuggled using the same method. Among others, the workers were also carrying a large number of stickers with IMEI (International Mobile Equipment Identity) numbers that were torn from retail boxes.
The news was first reported by iPadizate, a blogging platform dedicated to providing news about Apple technology products.
