A TikTok user got more than he bargained for when he bought a used car online. Abdallah, who goes by @.a.b.a.z on the platform, shared what happened after his purchase in a video that got over 10.6 million views.
Abdallah bought a white Jeep Grand Cherokee from sellers he felt were suspicious. The deal seemed too good to be true, and it turns out his gut feeling was right. A few days after buying the car, his neighbor saw someone trying to steal it from his driveway while he was at work. This made Abdallah decide to check the car carefully.
As per the TikTok video, when he looked under the driver’s seat and lifted up the carpet, he found an Apple AirTag hiding in a small storage space. The tiny tracking device costs about $29 and looked like it was put there on purpose. But that was not the only problem with the car.
Things got worse from there
After he took out the AirTag, Abdallah heard a strange sound each time he started the car. It sounded like a camera turning on. He tried to find where the noise was coming from but could not figure it out right away. Then something even weirder started happening.
An unmarked tow truck would show up at his house around 2am every night. It looked like someone was checking to see if the car was still there. Abdallah got scared and started keeping his car in a garage instead of outside.
In more videos he posted later, Abdallah said he changed the car’s key but still could not find the camera. After more searching, he finally found a small device hidden near the overhead window. It was stopping the window from closing all the way. He also found other cables and devices in different parts of the car. The whole thing freaked him out so much that he ended up selling the car. Much like a Florida man who exposed deceptive practices at auto service centers, this shows how people can get tricked in car deals.
Some people who watched the video thought the story might be fake. They noticed some things did not add up in his videos. But even if this exact story is not real, the problem he talked about is very real. Police in many states have caught people doing this kind of scam.
In Minnesota, a 20-year-old man got arrested for selling stolen cars on Facebook Marketplace. He would hide AirTags in the cars so he could find them later and steal them back to sell again. He admitted to doing this seven times in Minnesota and twice in Illinois.
People who commented on the video had different reactions. One person noticed the AirTag still had plastic wrap on it, which means it might not have even been working. Others told Abdallah to make sure he had good insurance in case someone actually stole the car.
The video is a warning to anyone buying a used car from strangers online. It shows why you need to check every part of a used car before you buy it and watch out for tracking devices. Similar to how shoppers protect themselves from overspending by following simple rules, car buyers should make their own safety rules when buying from people they do not know.
