{"id":250018,"date":"2026-05-20T00:40:00","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T04:40:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/05\/20\/phone-return-fraud-scammers-are-tricking-utahns-into-shipping-them-free-iphones\/"},"modified":"2026-05-20T01:55:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T05:55:10","slug":"phone-return-fraud-scammers-are-tricking-utahns-into-shipping-them-free-iphones","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/05\/20\/phone-return-fraud-scammers-are-tricking-utahns-into-shipping-them-free-iphones\/","title":{"rendered":"Phone return fraud: Scammers are tricking Utahns into shipping them ‘free’ iPhones"},"content":{"rendered":"

Phone return fraud: Scammers are tricking Utahns into shipping them ‘free’ iPhones<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/ksltv.com\/ksl-investigates\/get-gephardt\/phone-return-fraud-scammers-are-tricking-utahns-into-shipping-them-free-iphones\/910384\/<\/a><\/p>\n

Publish Date: 2026-05-20 00:40:00<\/a><\/p>\n

Source Domain: ksltv.com<\/a><\/p>\n

OGDEN \u2014 Imagine getting billed month after month for a phone you never wanted and that you thought you had already sent back to the carrier. That\u2019s the situation Terry Caselli faces.<\/p>\n

It started with a call last July. The caller claimed to be from Xfinity and offered Terry a lower bill and a free iPhone.<\/p>\n

\u201cI said, \u2018Well, I don\u2019t need a phone,\u2019\u201d Caselli recalled.<\/p>\n

He declined the offer. But days later, the iPhone showed up anyway. Then, within minutes of delivery came another call from the same caller.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey said that they mailed that to me by mistake,\u201d Caselli said.<\/p>\n

The caller begged him to rush the phone back. So, he printed the prepaid return label and shipped it off.<\/p>\n

Within weeks, new charges hit his cell phone bill. He immediately called Xfinity.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo, what\u2019s this for?\u201d he asked the customer service agent.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, that\u2019s for the iPhone,\u201d the agent responded.<\/p>\n

\u201cI said, \u2018I don\u2019t have an iPhone,\u2019\u201d Caselli said.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s when he realized he\u2019d been scammed by someone pretending to be an Xfinity agent.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s how this phone return fraud works: A crook calls the customer claiming to be from the carrier. They\u2019ll offer the customer a deal for the service or a free device like an iPhone. During the call, the crook tricks the customer into giving up account info. Once the call ends, they use that info to log into the customer\u2019s account with the carrier and order a phone. It\u2019ll be shipped to the customer\u2019s actual address. Within minutes of delivery, the crook, still pretending to be from the carrier, calls back with apologies for some sort of mistake. They send the customer a prepaid return label so the phone can be shipped back immediately. Except the address on that label really goes to the crook. They get the phone. The customer gets the bill.<\/p>\n

It neatly sidesteps fraud protections because the carrier sees the device going to its legitimate customer.<\/p>\n

Caselli said Xfinity removed the charge, but…<\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Phone return fraud: Scammers are tricking Utahns into shipping them ‘free’ iPhones https:\/\/ksltv.com\/ksl-investigates\/get-gephardt\/phone-return-fraud-scammers-are-tricking-utahns-into-shipping-them-free-iphones\/910384\/ Publish Date:…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":250020,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/ksltv.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/CLIP-ONE-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[120],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-250018","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-iphone"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250018"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=250018"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250018\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":250021,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250018\/revisions\/250021"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/250020"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=250018"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=250018"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=250018"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}