SSD fakes are getting more sophisticated here's how to avoid falling victim to the scammers

Date:
Mon, 30 Mar 2026 17:00:00 +0000

Description:
You may not realize the expensive SSD you've bought is a fake so make sure you check your purchases carefully.

FULL STORY ======================================================================Copy link Facebook X Whatsapp Reddit Pinterest Flipboard Threads Email Share this article 0 Join the conversation Follow us Add us as a preferred source on Google Newsletter Tech Radar Get daily insight, inspiration and deals in your inbox Sign up for breaking news, reviews, opinion, top tech deals, and more. Become a Member in Seconds Unlock instant access to exclusive member
features. Contact me with news and offers from other Future brands Receive email from us on behalf of our trusted partners or sponsors By submitting
your information you agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy and are aged 16 or over. You are now subscribed Your newsletter sign-up was successful Join the club Get full access to premium articles, exclusive features and a growing list of member rewards. Explore An account already exists for this email address, please log in. Subscribe to our newsletter A fake Samsung 990 Pro SSD was found to be very convincing It looked authentic, reported the correct capacity, and even worked like a real 990 Pro in some benchmarks However, a full suite of testing revealed the weakness in the
drive and there are steps you can take to protect yourself Fake SSDs and RAM scams are becoming more commonplace now that these products have gotten so expensive , but often such knock-offs are easy to spot although that's not the case with the latest imitation Samsung drive.

There are no clearly inauthentic packaging or product labels, or other
obvious giveaways here, and as Japanese tech site Akiba PC Hotline discovered (via Tom's Hardware) , you might not even realize this Samsung 990 Pro SSD
was a fake clone at all. As Akiba puts it: "More sophisticated counterfeit SSDs have appeared," while warning that these fakes, which are "harder to distinguish from genuine ones, are now flooding the market" (bear in mind
this is a translation). Granted, there are clues for the tech-savvy Sherlocks out there to pick up, such as the wrong model of SSD controller on the drive (a Maxio MAP1602, rather than the Pascal controller it should be). Article continues below You may like Budget laptops advertised with 1.1TB storage could have a huge cloudy catch Corsair's DDR5 RAM now comes in different packaging to foil RAM scammers The RAM shortage claims another victim as PS5 SSD prices rocket here's why now is the worst time to buy and what to do instead

There are plenty of folks who wouldn't think to check that kind of detail, though, and overall, this forgery of a drive fully looked the part, plus it reported the correct capacity when installed.

It could even keep up the act through some benchmarks, and as Akiba found, some basic tests showed performance very close to what you'd expect to see with the Samsung 990 Pro. It was close enough that you wouldn't question the drive on that basis, whereas many fake SSDs would be completely off the pace with any such testing (and may not even report the correct capacity).

However, with sustained testing, Akiba found that large file writing operations (copying a big video onto the drive) saw the fake SSD fall way behind its expected performance (once it had run out of cache). In these scenarios, it was running at about a fifteenth of the speed it should have been, and given that, it's clear that something is very wrong. Analysis: be careful where you buy and call in the 'Magician' (or similar) (Image credit: Akiba PC Hotline) While some folks might feel that this drive isn't that difficult to spot as a fake, everything is relative here. And because it appears to be a genuine Samsung 990 Pro in terms of the packaging and drive labelling, and reports the correct size in Windows and even passes muster in quick tests with, say, CrystalDiskMark the reality is that this is going to fool many people. Maybe not really techie folks, as noted, but it's a convincing enough scam that it's far more dangerous than the typical efforts we've seen in the past. Get daily insight, inspiration and deals in your
inbox Sign up for breaking news, reviews, opinion, top tech deals, and more. Contact me with news and offers from other Future brands Receive email from
us on behalf of our trusted partners or sponsors By submitting your information you agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy and are aged 16 or over.

The likely scenario with this drive is that the scammers have used cheap QLC instead of Samsung's TLC flash memory that should be in the 990 Pro, and this is how they're carving out a profit (and where the performance falls down in sustained workloads). Given that the Samsung 990 Pro now costs around $250 in the US even in its smallest capacity of 1TB, there's clearly money to be made
and large drives are now ridiculously expensive (for the 4TB model, you're looking at a grand, no less, these days).

So, how can you be more vigilant and avoid a scam like this? For starters, don't buy from third-party marketplace sellers, because if something is suspicious about the SSD you've purchased, you'll want to be dealing with a reputable retailer (and not, potentially, the architect of the scam itself).

Aside from that, if you buy a new SSD , make sure that you benchmark it thoroughly to put the drive through its paces and spot any potential weak points, such as the QLC switch-out seen here. Alternatively, with a Samsung drive, you can use the Samsung Magician software to check if the SSD is an authentic product there's no pulling the wool over the eyes of this app, as you might imagine.

Other drive makers offer similar tools or verification methods on their websites that you can use to ensure the authenticity of a purchased product. Contact the drive maker's customer support if you're unsure about how to
check up on what you've bought, and you'll doubtless be pointed in the right direction. The best SSDs for all budgets Our top picks, based on real-world testing

Read our full guide to the best SSD 1. Best overall: WD_Black SN8100 2. Best budget: Orico O7000 3. Best gaming: SK Hynix Platinum P51 4. Best professional: Samsung 9100 Pro 5. Best for PS5 Samsung 990 Pro Follow TechRadar on Google News and add us as a preferred source to get our expert news, reviews, and opinion in your feeds. Make sure to click the Follow button!

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Link to news story: https://www.techradar.com/computing/storage-backup/ssd-fakes-are-getting-more- sophisticated-heres-how-to-avoid-falling-victim-to-the-scammers


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