Qi and his expensive GPS card
The advent of mobile phones with GPS technology may have made people easier to track, but even GPS can’t save us from karma. That’s what Mr. Qi, a 45-year-old Chinese man learned the hard way when he tried to use GPS to track down his ex-girlfriend and ended up out several hundred dollars.
Qi’s girlfriend left him, and on the advice of friends, Qi decided to look into tracking her via global positioning systems. He found a number online and ordered a card that ostensibly was supposed to help him track her down. He paid 1200 RMB ($190) for it. But then when he tried to use it to connect to the system, he discovered it required a password. He contacted the seller, who sold him a password for 600 RMB ($95).
But after Qi entered that password, he discovered the system wanted another password before he could get online and start tracking his (former) girlfriend. Qi contacted the seller again and was told this password would cost 800 RMB, but Qi was eventually able to talk the seller down to 600 ($95).
At this point, Qi had spent about $380 on the GPS tracking system, but when he tried to get online, the system told him that he also needed a “network access code.” Again, Qi contacted the seller to ask what that would cost, and was told that it would run him a whopping 10,000 RMB ($1,587). Qi declined to pay it and gave up the search for his girlfriend.
Of course, had Qi had a little foresight and knowledge of mobile apps, he could have just spent a few dollars on a GPS tracking app for his girlfriend’s phone before she left. But the real lesson here is probably that if your girlfriend leaves, it’s best not to use technology to try to track her down like a stalker. Even if you find her, karma will find you, and you don’t want that.
(As a side note: these tricked-into-paying-a-ton-for-technology stories are quite common in China. One can only hope that as internet access, smartphones, and other gadgets become more mainstream, fewer and fewer people will fall into the traps of criminals who prey on the technologically ignorant).
[Southern Metropolis Daily via Sina Tech]