Apple Loses Another iPhone, Sprint Raises Termination Fees

Credit: CNET

Apple is quite secretive about its upcoming products. Many top tech companies use intentional leaks to create hype around their products. Apple has had to deal with unintentional leaks too. The company’s testers keep losing prototypes or so it seems. As multiple sources have reported, an employee of Apple has lost an iPhone 5 (we think) prototype at a Bay Area bar. The last lost iPhone prototype was sold for $5000 to a gadget blog. CNET reports that this time the phone may have been sold for as low as $200 on Craigslist.

While details are quite sketchy on this lost device, there is a good chance it is an iPhone 5 unit. The person who has picked up and sold this unit is going to learn his/her lesson the hard way. Apple was not quite forgiving the last time this happened. The company has already notified the authorities and traced the phone as well. The person to whom the phone was traced back to has denied knowing anything about it nor has he decided to accept money to return the phone..

We do have a bit of a hard time believing that Apple testers are so careless with super secret devices they are testing. It does seem that Apple gets a kick out of getting its lost phones covered in the media for weeks. Stunts such as this are not in Apple’s DNA, which means the company probably did lose another prototype by accident.

At this point, we can only hope to see some leaked pictures of this device in the near future. Apple will most likely find this device and some people will get what they deserve for stealing it. iPhone 5’s release date is only a few weeks away anyway.

Interestingly enough, Sprint has decided to join AT&T and Verizon in putting a hefty termination fee on its phone agreements. The company plans to charge its customers $350 for getting out of “advanced” phone contracts, making it expensive for people to buy subsidized phones and ditch their plans. Is that too greedy of Sprint? You be the judge.