Florida man gets 4 and-a-half years in prison for Apple Pay fraud worth $1.5 million

A man has been jailed for more than four years in Florida, over a fraudulent Apple Pay scheme worth over $1.5 million.

Daniel Butler, a 30 year-old-man from Miami, Florida has been sentenced to 54 months in federal prison, after pleading guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and aggravated identity theft in May this year.

According to the DOJ, Butler and three other individuals fraudulently obtained the information for at least 477 credit cards, linking them to Apple Pay on their iPhones. Butler, along with Johnny Wesley (24), Rachel Bishop (27) and Laurent Louise (31), all from Miami, used their iPhones to make fraudulent purchases at various retailers using the stolen card information.

Because there's no limit to Apple Pay transactions, the group was able to make more than $1.5 million in fraudulent purchases.

Of the group, Wesley was previously sentenced to four years in federal prison in December 2018, the remaining co-conspirators will be sentenced in December of this year.

It's reported by 9to5Mac that the group contacted various banks posing as account holders in order to obtain the necessary information required to setup Apple Pay. The fraud dates as far back as 2015, and the group was able to take advantage of weak ID checks made by the bank.