Apple leaker Sonny Dickson purchases brand-name fashion items, like these Louis Vuitton sunglasses, with the money he makes from selling Apple prototypes. He didn't want to be photographed and asked that his age not be published but supplied the photo for this story. Mr Dickson has been distributing photos of leaked Apple device prototypes for a number of years. In Skype and phone interviews with Fairfax Media, he said he also had a keen interest in uncovering upcoming features in Apple operating systems by trawling through developer code for signs engineers have left behind. A blogger who has worked with him to publish the leaked prototypes said Mr Dickson had made a name for himself in the trade of Apple-owned material "which no one else would post online". "He also clearly has some connections in Apple's Asia supply chain to obtain these parts, and I find Sonny very dedicated," the blogger said.

"Apple watches me every single day," Mr Dickson said, referring to his website's analytics data, which he claimed show that in a recent one-month period it was viewed at least 100 times by Apple staff. A picture of the iPad mini back-casing Sonny posted before the mini's unveiling. The only thing that changed before launch was the removal of what appears to be a second microphone at the top centre. "They always want to know what I know," he said. His photos often give Apple watchers an idea of what might be included in upcoming Apple products – or in some cases what might not make the final cut. In one case, when many believed near-field communication and a fingerprint scanner would be included in the iPhone 5, Mr Dickson was able to rule this out by showing photos that proved this was wrong. A picture Sonny posted of an iPhone 5 battery before the phone's launch. The battery and specifications listed on it turned out to be true.

"It wasn't going to happen," Mr Dickson said of NFC and fingerprint scanning. "People thought it was going to, but I said it wasn't going to happen and I found out. People said there was a part in the screen, and then I found out it wasn't actually in there. So I told the internet about it." He said he developed relationships with his sources not by flying to the US or China, but by hanging out in online forums or on Chinese social networking websites like Weibo.com. He uses Google Translate, an online translation service, to communicate with non-English-speaking sources. "Over the years I've collected friends and sources from China and Apple … So I've got a really good bond with them [and] they tell me information they shouldn't and then I just post it." Making money

As well as leaking photos and information on Apple device prototypes, which he mostly receives directly from factories, Mr Dickson has also made a business out of selling them. He also runs an iPhone repair business for people local to him. "What I do online is kind of turning into a business because it can pay my bills and pay for my Apple products and stuff like that," he said. "If I need money, I can get money basically. It's not really like a wage [but] if I need something I can just get it from someone [and] if I need to get a new iPhone, I'd find a prototype and then sell it off and then I'd get the money [for it] from that." Although he admits he could be breaking the law by on-selling the goods, he said he believes he has found a way around getting into trouble. "You could say I'm breaking the law," he said, "but I have changed [the buying and selling process] so that I don't actually have to touch the devices any more. I'm a middleman."

He said he changed his strategy in January after one of his sources told him that Apple's global security team was about to start an investigation. Within 20 hours of hearing this, he sold and mailed all of the prototypes in his possession to a friend in the US, he said. "I had to get rid of them." An Apple spokeswoman declined to comment.