In one of the strangest shipping scams we've ever seen, a man who says he ordered an iPhone 15 Pro directly from Apple's website instead received a disturbing surprise at his doorstep

This baffling story was posted on Reedit this week by Ed, of Surrey, England, who goes by the Reddit handle theEdmard He claims that after ordering an iPhone from Apple's website, he received the usual delivery confirmation email from Apple, as well as tracking details from their shipping partner, Dynamic Parcel Distribution (DPD)

However, after the package arrived, opening it revealed several red flags that something was not quite right For starters, the phone was covered by a screen protector

"The next thing I noticed when I turned it on, the screen is incorrect, it lights up black in a way that is clearly not OLED, and has a jaw at the bottom, suggesting this is not right for the phone," Ed wrote Apple's iPhone 15 series design features uniform bezels around the four edges

The alarm bells only grew louder when the phone was turned on Several apps including Facebook, YouTube, and TikTok came pre-installed, something Apple never does, and Ed described a "very poor setup process" where Android's toast (little operation-related pop-ups) appear The OS is glitchy There were many, the camera "looks like a slideshow and crashes when you try to use on-screen UI elements," and most disturbingly, the battery settings page indicated that this device had been used before

So Ed concluded that the device was actually an Android phone running a software skin made to look like the Apple iOS user interface

"I quickly realized it was an android device in a skin That may have convinced my grandfather, but I was able to tell very quickly," he writes

According to Mashable, Ed, COO of cloud software provider AtWrk, said he contacted Apple and has an open ticket with Apple support He told the outlet, which confirmed the email order confirmation he received from Apple, that Apple has been "very accommodating" about the disturbance, but so far the issue remains unresolved Tom's Guide has also contacted Apple to confirm the situation

Fortunately, after finding the fake, Ed had not logged on with his Apple ID and had successfully skipped all the setup screens to get into the phone Had he entered his Apple ID and password, or linked his Apple Wallet, whatever fraudsters were behind the device could have accessed his personal and financial information

More alarmingly, it appears that Ed is not the only target of this particular scam; Mashable described an eerily identical situation where a fake Android was mailed to him instead of a legitimately ordered Apple iPhone 15 Pro Max, and a recent TikTok featured

Needless to say, this is a good reminder for all of us to be very careful when it comes to technology Be sure to thoroughly inspect the packaging of your new phone before entering any personal information or signing for the shipment And while you're looking out for security, check out the following seven important security measures to better protect all your Apple devices