14 DAY TRIAL // We have known what the iPhone 6 looks like for at least a month in advance. First there were some parts like the buttons, camera, and other small leaks.
Then we saw the back panel, and shortly after that there was a screen. Everyone thought it is a sapphire display, but Apple proved not to have the new screen made out of sapphire.
The leaks
Two weeks before the big announcement we saw some fully assembled phones, complete with screens, the Apple logo, logic board, and other parts inside it. Even the battery leaked at some point. Two days before Apple's fall event there were some pictures and videos showing a device that looked pretty much like the real thing. Of course, the report was not confirmed in any way.
Now, it seems that one of the guys who were sneaking out parts for the iPhone 6 was detained by the local police. According to the Wall Street Journal, the guy used to work for Foxconn, Apple's most prominent manufacturer in China. He stole iPhone 6 back covers and wanted to sell six of them for about $960 (€741.36) in a market located in the southern city Shenzhen.
Payback time
The thief is a 40-year old male identified as Qiao. It is not known whether he stole any other parts that were leaked before the arrest was made, but he will probably spend some time in the jail for that.
Apple has declined to comment on this, and the thief's employer representatives just said they expected their people to follow the internal code of conduct.
According to local media cited by the Wall Street Journal, Mr. Qiao found an ad in a local newspaper posted by someone who was paying a lot of money to get iPhone 6 parts. Back in July, he took out of the factory a rear shell and had it hidden in his jacket. He somehow managed to get past security and sold the part for $160 (€123.56).
Business was good, he thought, so he stole a few more parts and sent those over to the same buyer. Foxconn only reported those missing parts over a year later, so the police had to spend over 20 days watching security surveillance videos to catch the thief.
Now that we know what the iPhone 6 looks like, we don't care that much about parts. However, Mr. Qiao will not be out of prison for the iPhone 6 launch in his country.