EVGA's Stolen GPU Haul Turns Up in Vietnam

A truckload of EVGA branded graphics cards reported stolen last October has apparently surfaced on the other side of the world. The GeForce card shipment was originally swiped on its route from San Francisco to Southern California, but has now reportedly surfaced a long way from its intended destination – in Vietnam. The Vietnamese Gaming Drama Facebook group posted that a user had evidence that the stolen goods were being resold at retail (hat tip to VideoCardz for spotting it).

Cong Nguyen PC store advert

Facebook advert for what are thought to be the stolen EVGA graphics cards (Image credit: Cong Nguyen PC store)

In the wake of the shipment heist last year, EVGA confirmed that the truck contained boxes full of graphics cards spanning the GeForce RTX 30-series product line with MSRPs between $329.99 and $1,959.99 per unit.

EVGA Product Manager Jacob Freeman appealed for information about these purloined products, providing a dedicated email address for anyone with further information regarding the perpetrators or whereabouts of the haul. Freeman warned potential buyers of the stolen goods of the criminal implications in the US. Moreover, anyone who bought or otherwise obtained one of these stolen graphics cards would not receive product support, warranties, or upgrade offers, said Freeman. Furthermore, EVGA had records of the stolen GPU serial and part numbers. 

In our report of the robbery, we mused about the graphics cards which had gone missing being bought up by a crypromining outfit or being sold off via online auction or social media sales channels. However, the truth might be even more bizarre. Having arrived in Vietnam, the shipment seems to have been bought up by a major PC components retailer who offers this GeForce RTX 30 series stock with reduced 1-month warranties and lower-than-usual prices.

The above-linked Facebook post appears to be from a user who bought an EVGA branded GeForce RX 3080 Ti at Cong Nguyen PC store, Ho Chi Minh City branch. The user says they got the card home and installed it in a PC, but it wouldn't register with EVGA as it was "on a ban list."

The PC store is a sizable outlet in Vietnam that has previously been in its news stream for showing off crypto mining rigs stuffed with hard-to-get and often special edition Nvidia GPUs (e.g., Asus Gundam Series GPUs). Of course, the right thing to do is not to handle stolen goods, and we hope Cong Nguyen PC store gets in touch with EVGA, as it must now be aware of the provenance of this EVGA graphics card shipment if it was previously ignorant.

Mark Tyson
News Editor

Mark Tyson is a news editor at Tom's Hardware. He enjoys covering the full breadth of PC tech; from business and semiconductor design to products approaching the edge of reason.

  • richard_mp
    Lets see. Lower than usual prices and one month warranty.

    Pretty sure they got them cheap and knew they were stolen.


    Now they might not have known the when and where but there is no way they purchased them below market and thought the cards were legitimate.
    Reply
  • JamesJones44
    Cool! Lets continue move all our manufacturing there so they don't have to ship the product back over seas! It's even better for the environment too, less fuel!
    Reply
  • Makaveli
    For sure they bought these "hot" and knew it. I hope EVGA has the power to do something about this in Vietnam.
    Reply
  • Exploding PSU
    You know what, that white GPU in the rightmost PC looks mighty fine
    Reply
  • SkyBill40
    Gooooooooooooooooooood Morning, Vietnam! LOL
    Reply
  • Darkbreeze
    And WHY is it that there are not already sanctions in place against that "major PC vendor" by EVGA and other tech manufacturers, since clearly they care nothing about the losses incurred by these companies due to criminal enterprises like this?

    EVERY single supplier should boycott that company and refuse to ship them anything until they return every identified stolen component. This is exactly the same as companies that sell "grey" software licenses. When you don't insist on crap being legit it just makes it simple for this kind of crap to continue and that ends up costing US all a lot more, because these companies don't just "write it off". They just raise prices for legitimate purchasers like us. Heck that.
    Reply
  • cats_Paw
    10 bucks says they used the GPU for minning etherum and are now trying to dump them after the drop in etherum profitability.
    Reply
  • nogaard777
    Sucks that this happened to evga as they're the last somewhat honest AIB left it seems. Not that all aibs aren't making money hand over fist right now.

    Would be nice to see some unity in boycotting this specific outlet from allocation of all hardware from all vendors, but that will never happen as they're all perfectly happy shipping pallets of cards directly to mining outfits without even giving gamers a chance at them.
    Reply