Dead units of NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 4090 graphics cards are circulating marketplaces as bogus listings, and a new scam has been discovered.
NVIDIA's Flagship Graphics Card, The GeForce RTX 4090, Is Being Used To Scam Several Individuals Out There, Buyers Advised To Proceed With Caution
When it comes to frauds across the "used" GPU markets, it is quite common to encounter one, especially on resellers such as eBay, which are not regulated properly. In light of that, Northwest Repair has highlighted an incident experienced by one of these customers who had bought a used GeForce RTX 4090 graphics card from an individual at Facebook Marketplace, only to realize that the unit was stripped out of its most vital components.
Well, this isn't certainly new, as we see average buyers becoming victims of such frauds quite often simply because of a lack of knowledge or deception by the seller. After realizing that the GPU wasn't working, the scammed individual took the defective unit to a nearby tech shop, where he was told that the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 he bought was fried, and they offered to buy it for $200 from him as well. The victim rejected the offer, hoping his GPU would sell for even higher, but he didn't realize what was coming.
When the unit was sent to Northwest Repair, upon opening it, it was shocking to witness that the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 had its GPU and memory removed entirely, and it was literally "empty" from the inside. This meant that the buyer received only the original card's PCB, & the components were probably sold off for separate profits. The situation is indeed disappointing to witness, and since the flagship Ada Lovelace SKUs have been scarce in the markets, individuals are trying to scam buyers by several means.
One would wonder why are these users selling GPU-less PCBs but we should mention that this is a big business in China. Several NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 cards are being stripped apart of their vital components such as GPUs and VRAM and being housed on different boards made for AI platforms. The component-less PCBs are then thrown away and sold off for dirt cheap rates, we have noticed them go for $10-$20 US at online marketplaces. These scams were previously limited to just China and APAC regions but have now expanded to other regions too.
This is the dark side of the used markets, and we advise users not to adhere to them for their purchases unless they are from verified sources. One should implement adequate steps, including testing and benchmarking the GPU or probably inspecting it from reputable tech shops, to guarantee a safe purchase.
News Source: I_Leak_VN
