A 1 Of 1 Victor Wembanyama card was graded a 10 by PSA. Seems like the card was polished/altered given that the submitter gave a shout out to Kurt’s Card Care products for being phenomenal for the card right inside PSA’s headquarters lol.
Apparently PSA claims that the card was not altered:
I know we cannot confirm if the card is actually altered by Kurt’s cream, but it really got me thinking if PSA or any other grading companies can actually detect this alteration.
The card was released in 2023. What are the chances that some gimmick product to clean cards was used or needed? Perhaps the submitter was paid to give a shout out. I imagine that the truth may be far less exciting than what we want it to be in this situation.
Why would he do that though. Won’t he risk the cert being deactivated if he says this nonsense infront of psa right in their office. Thats an expensive card right there.
Even if the card was released in 2023, so what? New pack fresh cards does not mean mint.
A trimmed psa10 zard got by PSA too. Not surprised if an altered card got pass them.
Shouting out a company would not risk the card’s authenticity. This is a nonstory.
Oh yea, I remembered when I talk about and thank a random product and company I didn’t use when I’m getting a PSA 10 1/1.
This is called a paid promotion. The submitter knew that they had an expensive card, and the business capitalized on the incredible advertisement opportunity.
Why would a product be needed to alter/polish a card that was printed a few months ago? No need to jump to conclusions and conspiracy theories when the more likely answer is money.
If this was talking about CGC, CGC would have blown up in flames in the comments/social media.
You got a video with 4000 views, a thread on e4 about it, a journalist talking about how there are “lots of conversations about it”. What more do you expect? Especially since it’s not even a Pokemon card
Giving shout out to card altering product in front of PSA staff is tcg equivalent of this interview. 
Opossum posted a video accusing PSA of grading this altered card but didn’t even leave open the possibility that the dude was shouting out one of his favorite companies or he used other things the company sells. So I posted this to his video, curious to see his response
Dude, you’re jumping to conclusions. Let me blow your mind - that company sells multiple products and not all of them are foreign substances 
now I think odds are your right, but you shouldn’t jump to this conclusion
You guys who think PSA can detect cards cleaned and altered by the Kurts product are way too confident and blind believers in PSA’s abilities. Check out the following video. Yes I know it’s SGC making the statement, but I have no reason to believe PSA is any different.
(8:44 time mark)
Who are you referring to?
I first read this thread a few days ago, and I thought above there was someone in this thread claiming PSA had the technology to detect altered cards and there was no way a treated card would pass their inspection. I just re-read the posts above mine and no longer see that post. Maybe it was deleted/edited prior to my post, or it was on a different forum altogether.
Apologies now for making it sound like I’m directing my comment to someone here.
There’s no deleted comment so maybe it was another thread?
Anyway, back on topic. If there is no way to “measure” an an alteration, it is effectively an unaltered card for all intents and purposes. Just like the SGC guy said
PSA really can’t detect certain alterations like removing scratches.
Another proof here. The torchic is the same as you can see from the red imprint near the “fireworks” attack line.
But yea if grading companies can’t detect these treatments, theses “altered” card can’t be considered as altered I guess.
Here’s that same card on eBay, for anyone who wants to avoid buying an altered card:
Nice find.
Again not sure how I feel about the whole thing
I won’t be happy if I purchased a high grade card and then down the road realise it has undergone some sort of “cleaning”.
Old cert premium time? 
It’s not that the cards aren’t altered, or that there’s no way to measure it. It’s that the grading companies’ processes aren’t sophisticated or thorough enough.
Imagine there’s a very convincing method to color in whitening on the back of a card. You can’t detect any difference under a loupe, but if you test the patch of color with something like an IR spectrometer you’d find the ink isn’t original, and was applied by someone years after printing to increase the value. Grading companies don’t notice because it’s very expensive to test every submission with a spectrometer. Is the card altered, even if it’s impossible to find a difference without advanced equipment? Would it be less valuable or desirable than a pack-fresh mint copy (if the buyer isn’t kept in the dark about the coloring)?
I’d say yes, and that it’s not even really debatable. Grading companies aren’t research laboratories. There’s a hard limit to what they can (or are willing to) do. If alteration techniques pass that limit it doesn’t mean the card isn’t altered anymore, it only means grading companies can’t effectively check for alterations anymore.
