Anker recalls dangerous USB Type-C cables

As we've written before, poorly designed USB Type-C cables can cause a lot of issues and there are a lot of low-cost USB Type-C cables out there that are downright dangerous to use. Google engineer Benson Leung has made it his personal battle to weed out faulty cables and now he reports that Anker is recalling a cable (A8185011) it sold via Amazon:

Here's the email I got : We've heard that some units of our Anker PowerLine USB-C A8185011 may present slight technical issues, which could prevent the cable from performing at its full capacity or even cause damage to devices when used. Therefore, to ensure that all of our customers are getting only the best quality products from Anker, we have decided to recall all units of our Anker PowerLine USB-C A8185011 immediately.

We are offering all of our PowerLine USB-C A8185011 users a full refund. In addition, we would like to offer a free Anker PowerLine USB-C cable to affected customers once we have improved Anker PowerLine USB-C A8185011.

Please reply to this email with your choice and we'll process it as soon as possible. We will contact you regarding a free unit once the model has been released.

As we do not need to get the cable returned, please dispose of it accordingly and do not continue using it.

We want to assure you that we've taken all necessary measures to prevent this from happening again. We appreciate your preference and apologize for any inconveniences this has caused you.

As Nathan K. discovered, these cables are not safe to use: