AirTags are being used by organised crime groups to track luxury cars in Canada

[Video Beagle]

22 minutes ago, Elijah Kamski said:

i can't wait to go to public places where everyone is able to track everyone XD

it's cute you think people who want to track you need an apple device to do it. Criminals are gonna criminal.

All air tags add to the world is to everyday people access to tech to find their lost bags or dogs.

[Elijah Kamski]

3 minutes ago, Video Beagle said:

it's cute you think people who want to track you need an apple device to do it. Criminals are gonna criminal.

All air tags add to the world is to everyday people access to tech to find their lost bags or dogs.

Yeah, I know XD

[Dracarris]

2 hours ago, Elijah Kamski said:

i can't wait to go to public places where everyone is able to track everyone XD

For the reasons outlined here using Airtags to track people is the stupiest choice as everyone with an iphone will get notified of the tracker. But hey, another round of fruit bashing and ripping yet another lame "Think different" "joke", I guess good for you?

2 hours ago, Spindel said:

That's because AirTags where never marketed as an anti-theft device. They where marketed as an device to keep track of stuff you might lose/forget at places, like a bag or wallet, keys etc so you can easily find them again. 

What a giant missed opportunity. Apple could single-handedly solve the main problem of anti-theft trackers.

[wanderingfool2]

3 hours ago, Dracarris said:

For the reasons outlined here using Airtags to track people is the stupiest choice as everyone with an iphone will get notified of the tracker. But hey, another round of fruit bashing and ripping yet another lame "Think different" "joke", I guess good for you?

If you know the person is an Android user then yea it's still a viable way of tracking someone...which for a lot of people is easy enough to figure out by simply viewing someone for a short period of time (as I've found most people tend to look at their phone quite often).  [There has already been cases of people being tracked by this]

 

The other problem being, until the last IOS update the feature to know that someone was tracking you didn't exist.

 

3 hours ago, Dracarris said:

What a giant missed opportunity. Apple could single-handedly solve the main problem of anti-theft trackers.

This type of tech is really a double edged sword.  As an anti-theft tracker, the changes they have made have effectively made it so thieves could detect an airtag hidden in a stolen purse or bike (since they now get an alert and can make it play a sound).  The upside to this being that people can now check if they are being stalked by someone.

 

If they removed the feature to detect hidden airtags then it could be used as anti-theft a lot easier but then again it leads to what we currently had...where people are being tracked and vehicles being tracked because it's a cheap and simple technology to deploy in the public.

[Franck]

Got this article about the air tag used to follow car about a month ago in my muscle car group and since then i have been scanning Bluetooth device every time i get in my beast

[Dracarris]

33 minutes ago, wanderingfool2 said:

The other problem being, until the last IOS update the feature to know that someone was tracking you didn't exist.

What exactly do you refer to with 'last iOS update'? That was iOS 15.x and I am pretty sure that this feature is supported way longer, back at 14.x already when Airtags where introduced.

33 minutes ago, wanderingfool2 said:

If you know the person is an Android user then yea it's still a viable way of tracking someone...which for a lot of people is easy enough to figure out by simply viewing someone for a short period of time (as I've found most people tend to look at their phone quite often).  [There has already been cases of people being tracked by this]

As soon as they travel/share a ride with someone else that owns an iDevice it is game over for this approach. Given the market share of Apple devices this is a matter of days unless you stalk a completely isolated-living Android user. Your scenario can happen but is very unlikely.

33 minutes ago, wanderingfool2 said:

If they removed the feature to detect hidden airtags then it could be used as anti-theft a lot easier but then again it leads to what we currently had...where people are being tracked and vehicles being tracked because it's a cheap and simple technology to deploy in the public.

There is a ton of devices in existence that can be used for stalking already, no one keeps you from achieving this. However for anti-theft they have the downside of requiring cellular data coverage which is energy intensive and specific to a country which is a huge problem everywhere outside of NA.

[tkitch]

On 12/5/2021 at 10:33 PM, FakeKGB said:

That's really stupid. I hope I don't need to explain why.

It's not stupid.

They're not talking about allowing you to see every single airtag that you come across.  Cuz yeah, that'd be super bad.

It's a potential security measure for when a tag is in your immediate vicinity for an extended period.  Cuz slipping something the size of a large coin into someone's bag, or into a hidden corner of someone's car to track it?  Way too fuckin' easy.

[tkitch]

On 12/6/2021 at 11:39 AM, poochyena said:

explain how that data point assists them in breaking into a vehicle.

which has absolutely 0 connection to airtags.

If your car's parked in an airport garage for 3 days straight?

I've got news for you. 

[wanderingfool2]

12 minutes ago, Dracarris said:

What exactly do you refer to with 'last iOS update'? That was iOS 15.x and I am pretty sure that this feature is supported way longer, back at 14.x already when Airtags where introduced.

Well rather, a way to check yourself...also there are people who are already discovering that they were being tracked using airtags, so the "automatic" way they had it setup isn't really a reliable way.

 

13 minutes ago, Dracarris said:

As soon as they travel/share a ride with someone else that owns an iDevice it is game over for this approach. Given the market share of Apple devices this is a matter of days unless you stalk a completely isolated-living Android user. Your scenario can happen but is very unlikely.

It's not unlikely, even in it's current state it's being used to track people.  It's happened, google Brooks Nader...not being notified until she was isolated hours after the fact.  A stalker getting your private home address is all they would need to properly stalk you (and again if you have an android it becomes a lot less likely of being able detect it).  From my knowledge of the "auto" detection, it might only apply when the airtag is moving with you to multiple locations, so unless you are traveling with the same iphone users you are unlikely to know.  There are also a wave of people finding it on their vehicles.

 

22 minutes ago, Dracarris said:

There is a ton of devices in existence that can be used for stalking already, no one keeps you from achieving this. However for anti-theft they have the downside of requiring cellular data coverage which is energy intensive and specific to a country which is a huge problem everywhere outside of NA.

There are a ton of devices that can be used to stalk someone yes, but that's a terrible line of reasoning to argue against my point.  AirTags are cheap, and thanks to Apple forcing it into the IOS platform have a high fidelity in location tracking.  Other types of networks like Tile, while similar in pricing don't offer nearly as much resolution and would have required mass amounts of customers to get anywhere near what Apple has.

[Dracarris]

2 hours ago, wanderingfool2 said:

It's not unlikely, even in it's current state it's being used to track people.  It's happened, google Brooks Nader

Many terrible things happened on a few occasions. Just because there are isolated cases doesn't mean it's a widespread issue.

2 hours ago, wanderingfool2 said:

There are a ton of devices that can be used to stalk someone yes, but that's a terrible line of reasoning to argue against my point.  AirTags are cheap, and thanks to Apple forcing it into the IOS platform have a high fidelity in location tracking.  Other types of networks like Tile, while similar in pricing don't offer nearly as much resolution and would have required mass amounts of customers to get anywhere near what Apple has.

So let me get this right, now what Apple does is bad because it is cheap and affordable? What would people say if Airtags were expensive? Tiles are not really any more expensive, offer the exact same resolution which is GPS based and simply require cellular coverage to report the location. Absolutely zero problem when stalking someone. Big problem when deploying it long-term on a bike where battery lifetime is an issue.

Strike that, both require phones with the respective SW at close proximity to be located. Which makes both not really a good choice for stalking people. So for the original scheme to work the thiefes require someone with an iphone to be close to the tagged car in order for the location to be relayed which again runs a high risk of triggering the anti-stalk feature?

 

There are plenty of devices to stalk people easily already. The only thing Apple would enable is eased long-term stalking.

[wanderingfool2]

4 minutes ago, Dracarris said:

So let me get this right, now what Apple does is bad because it is cheap and affordable? Wow that is dense. What would people say if Airtags were expensive? Tiles are not really any more expensive, offer the exact same resolution which is GPS based and simply require cellular coverage to report the location. Absolutely zero problem when stalking someone. Big problem when deploying it long-term on a bike where battery lifetime is an issue.

 

There are plenty of devices to stalk people easily already. The only thing Apple would enable is eased long-term stalking.

You are calling me dense, yet you aren't even properly reading what I said; plus you were the one that said it's an unlikely scenario, but people are already using airtags to track people...I can bet you that there are people being tracked who own an Android phone.  Did I say what Apple did was strictly bad, no...but while we are on the subject, Apple released a product that they claim takes measures to stop it being used for stalking yet they failed to create an Android App until it starts gaining ground that people are being tracked with it.  It's that same mentality that they use to try keeping people into their eco-system.

 

I also said Tile was similarly priced, but as I also said Apple has the benefit that they effectively turned their entire userbase into pinpointers.  With Tile I can bet that they have a lot less tracking resolution.

 

11 minutes ago, Dracarris said:

Many terrible things happened on a few occasions. Just because there are isolated cases doesn't mean it's a widespread issue.

The police have literally released warnings about this happening.  You honestly are talking as if you never had anyone in your life who has had a stalker before.

[Dracarris]

5 minutes ago, wanderingfool2 said:

The police have literally released warnings about this happening.  You honestly are talking as if you never had anyone in your life who has had a stalker before.

I hope they also release warnings about every other tracking device that is out there that does not require an iphone to be nearby to relay its location. And had at least one report about being used for stalking.

5 minutes ago, wanderingfool2 said:

I also said Tile was similarly priced, but as I also said Apple has the benefit that they effectively turned their entire userbase into pinpointers.

And into potential warning posts that they are being tracked. Which works - also in at least one case - as this article posted above shows. If the thieves had used a regular GPS+cellular tracker, the owner would have not been notified, independently of his phone brand.

[Video Beagle]

A criminal will use a hammer to smash a window or break a bone.

We do not judge tools by how criminals misuse them.

 

Someone does not decide to stalk a person or track a car because they have an airtag. They don't decide to not do it because they don't have one.

[RejZoR]

15 hours ago, wanderingfool2 said:

It's that same mentality that they use to try keeping people into their eco-system.

Here we go again with this bull. NO one, not even Apple is forcing you to be in their ecosystem. You're willingly choosing to do so. I decided I don't want to do ANYTHING with Google and their ecosystem. So I dumped all their services, have extensive automated system to block all their shit as far as it can go and I'm not using any Android devices. I CHOSE not to use Google stuff. Just as you can chose not to use Apple stuff. Leaving one or another to such extend is difficult and blaming them is some made up BS by whiners. There are some annoyances with Apple, but not much bigger than it was to leave Google's ecosystem.