ABC News:Mystery 'iPhone Girl' Generates Internet Intrigue

By MIN LEE Associated Press Writer HONG KONG August 27, 2008 (AP)
Who is the "iPhone Girl"?
Pictures of an Asian factory worker found on a new iPhone sold to a British customer have generated keen discussion on the Internet about her identity — and her fate.
The three pictures, posted on the Apple discussion Web site MacRumors.com, show a young Asian woman working on what appears to be an assembly line for iPhones.
Dressed in a pink striped outfit and hat and wearing white gloves with yellow fingertips, the young woman now known on the Web as the "iPhone Girl" is shown smiling and making victory signs as she poses next to an iPhone.
The MacRumors.com user who posted the photos last week, identified as only "markm49uk" from Kingston-upon-Hull, England, said in a posting that one of the pictures showed up on a new 3G iPhone when the iTunes program was launched.
News reports say the woman may work at a factory run by an Apple contractor, Taiwan-based Foxconn Technology Group, in the southern Chinese boomtown of Shenzhen.
Calls to Foxconn spokesman Edmund Ding went unanswered Wednesday. Ding also didn't immediately respond to an e-mail from The Associated Press seeking comment.
But the South China Morning Post on Wednesday quoted another Foxconn spokesman, Liu Kun, as confirming that the young woman in the pictures works for Foxconn.
Liu said workers testing the device took the pictures and may have forgotten to delete them, the Post reported.
Dubbing the mystery worker "China's prettiest factory girl," China's Southern Metropolitan Daily on Tuesday quoted an unidentified Foxconn official as saying the woman was not fired.
Apple publicist Jill Tan said the company had no comment.

Foxconn To Make Formal Announcement?

According to this translated excerpt (see below) from SZ News in China, Foxconn and Apple have discussed the situation and may make a formal announcement reguarding The iPhone Girl soon.

"Foxconn official said Tuesday, has reached an agreement with Apple, the two sides of the view that girls should be a beautiful flaws, they will not pursue girls Responsibility. And for the protection of the girls to consider, reveal other things inconvenient, but will consider in the near future to make an announcement on the incident. "

iPhone Girl news appears in Sweden

News of iPhoneGirl make it to Sweden. Please read the translated clip from Aftonbladet by Karin Holmberg below:

“The quest for “Iphonegirl”
Some pictures of a Chinese woman who smiles and makes “V” sign has been the whole world to talk about the mystical “Iphone-girl”. Now Chinese Internet users do everything possible to trace the young woman. The search for the girl started when a British Iphone users found images of the mill woman in her phone. The person la Print those on the MacRumors forums. The photos set in motion a chain reaction and Internet users in China is now making every effort to find out who the mysterious the woman really is. The woman working to mount Iphones is employed by the company FoxConn, which has most of its factories in Shenzhen near Hong Kong. Tested the camera on mobile phones A spokesperson for the company has confirmed that she is one of their employees and that they probably tested the camera in the cell phone and then forgotten to delete the photos, writes The Sydney Morning Herald online. In the camera, there were six pictures. Two of “Iphonegirl” dressed in rosarandiga fabrikskläder and four at the factory where she works. May not be sacked ”Small mistakes are inevitable”, “I would call this a beautiful mistake “to the Spokesperson Liu Kun as saying, according to AFP. Liu Kun continues to tell that the woman became nervous when the images began to appear in the newspapers and on Web pages. But the woman will not to get the sack for his mistake. Has limited it to 1000 On FoxConn’s factories in Shenzhen are working 270 000 employees, one of them is the mysterious “Iphone-girl”. The company will not reveal who she is.

In contrast, Chinese Internet users determined to find out. According to SMH, there has been more than 20 million searches for the term ”Iphonegirl” on Google.cn. Domain names iphonegirl.net and iphonegirl.cn has also bought up by people who hope to earn a hack on the mysterious woman. According to The Sydney Morning Herald has already succeeded in inernetanvändarna limit the number of “suspects” from 270 000 employees to 1000. They seem namely, to be sure that the woman working on quality control in the fifth våniingen in one of the factories and where work ”only” 1000 people. If they manage to find out who the smiling girl in fabriksdräkten is remains to be seen.”

Smiling iPhone Girl is definitely not fired

In an article published by the English Chinese paper, China Daily a Foxconn spokesperson confirms that The “iPhone Girl” is “definitely not fired”. Let's read the article:
“She might have done nothing more than flashed a smile to her colleague testing an iPhone’s camera on a Chinese production line. But it seems the colleague forgot to delete her photos, and now worldwide iPhone fans are gearing up to locate her.
The “iPhone girl” frenzy began last week when the girl’s photos appeared on MacRumors.com, a popular forum for fans of Apple products.
The photos show a round-faced Chinese girl dressed in pink, striped uniform, smiling and making a “V for Victory” gesture in what seems like an assembly line.
Many forum users commented that they found the girl “really cute, vivid, energetic, smile like sunshine a typical chinese girl". She loves and enjoys her job. Maybe iphone can really make this girl to be celebrity. I think that it is always better than chosing some model or star.Whatever, her life is changing now because of her little misplay. I am not sure it is a good or bad thing for her.
Other people worry that “she is so fired” because of the incident.
“She is definitely not fired,” an unidentified representative from Foxconn’s factory in Shenzhen, southern China, told the newspaper Xiandai Kuaibao.
The factory assembles most of Apple’s iPhones and iPods, the newspaper says.
The representative confirmed that the “iPhone girl” was one of its employees but declined to give details.
He said it was likely that the test photos were left in the phone’s memory “accidentally.” The company is investigating the incident.
Though the “iPhone girl” is yet to be traced, her popularity continues to grow. Someone has even created an English-language Web site, iPhonegirl.net, updated with global media reports on her.”

iPhone 3G Appear Smiling Chinese girl call "iphone

Maybe you will ask who is the iphone girl.The iphonegirl is a foxconn worker on the assembly line.Recently a smiling chinese girl photo is hotted on internet.
A British Internet user "Markm49uk" who posted the photos Buy the new iPhone 3G.Last week when he unboxed his iphone 3G,he found three more photos of a girl on the iPhone--one on the home screen,and others in the phone's photo album.
What's the photos show?It's a Chinese girl who is round-faced.She dressed in pink,striped uniform, and also being smiling and making a "V for Victory" gesture in what seems like an assembly line.She's so kinda cute.
He(iPhone girl) said it was likely that the test photos were left in the phone's memory "accidentally."

iPhonegirl pictures from iPhone 3G

On the website of the Mac Forums forums,markm49uk wrote:

Hi,
Not sure if this is or is not the 'norm' but I just received my brand new iPhone here in the UK and once it had been activated on iTunes I found that the home screen (the screen you can personalise with a photo) already had a photo set against it !!!!
It would appear that someone on the production line was having a bit of fun - has anyone else found this ?

And also with the photos here:

iphonegirl picture

iphonegirl picture