"Lufthansa bans AirTags in luggage after passengers publicly shame it with location of lost bags"

[THEDEATH]

Summary

Lufthansa argues that baggage trackers fall in the category of portable electronic devices, and are therefore subject to dangerous goods regulations issued by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).  This is specifically because of the transmission function. Lufthansa claims that the transmission function needs to be turned off during flight when in checked luggage, just as is required for cell phones, laptops, etc.

 

Quotes

Quote

Apple's AirTags are an excellent way to know where your luggage is—and a snitch on airlines who don't know where your luggage is. Lufthansa is the first to ban them after "an awful summer of lost bags", reports Ben Schlappig. The carrier cites the industry's undead policies against electronic devices on flights.

My thoughts

Lufthansa isn't exactly a customer-friendly airline, and the airline has had an awful summer when it comes to lost bags. AirTags empower travelers in terms of knowing exactly where their bags are. People have publicly shamed Lufthansa on twitter for not knowing when the owner knows the exact location. Now Lufthansa has banned them. 

 

Sources

https://www.businessinsider.com/lufthansa-bans-active-airtags-in-luggage-making-them-useless-report-2022-10?r=US&IR=T

 https://boingboing.net/2022/10/08/lufthansa-bans-airtags-in-luggage-after-passengers-publicly-shame-them-with-location-of-lost-luggage.html

 

[Lightwreather]

But… How are they planning on enforcing this?

According to what I know, it's small and and afaik has not triggered any Baggage scanner. But I could be wrong and it would be interesting if anyone has had a contrary experience.

[Eigenvektor]

9 minutes ago, Lightwreather JfromN said:

But… How are they planning on enforcing this?

They may not be able to detect it before the fact (~edit: would you want to risk it though?), but if you try to use it to embarrass them, you're basically indicting yourself…

 

I suspect they've got the law on their side in this, even though it's a shame, really.

[jagdtigger]

I wonder if ppl could sue them for theft because they falsely reporting the luggage as lost when in reality they have them in their possession.....

[Eigenvektor]

7 minutes ago, jagdtigger said:

I wonder if ppl could sue them for theft because they falsely reporting the luggage as lost when in reality they have them in their possession.....

Unlikely, that would require people to prove that Lufthansa intentionally lost their stuff in an attempt to enrich themselves. (I mean people could certainly sue them, it's just costly and unlikely to be met with success)

 

The luggage is probably just stuck somewhere in the underbelly of the airport and it's not cost effective to send people crawling through there in search of lost luggage, potentially stopping working machines and so on.

[PDifolco]

Another example of law abuse by corps... Welcome to Arasaka Tower !

[whispous]

Turns out that their message is wrong, and they do not ban Airtags. The battery inside an airtag is not classified the same as other banned items.

 

 

[Spotty]

11 minutes ago, whispous said:

Turns out that their message is wrong, and they do not ban Airtags. The battery inside an airtag is not classified the same as other banned items.

 

 

The airline's official Twitter is still tweeting only an hour ago saying that they're not allowed, considered a 'dangerous good' and must be deactivated. This tweet was sent out after the tweet you posted above.

Spoiler

 

[TetraSky]

Right right... So instead of fixing their issues of losing luggage, they prefer to go after the ways used by passengers to locate their luggage.
That make SO much sense to do... How are they even allowed to operate with such a horrible mindset.
Considering the very short range at which the air tags transmit to nearby phones, it wouldn't be an issue. Heck, the whole interference thing isn't an issue if they just shield the cargo compartment.. Which is likely already the case. (And even there, passengers have been known to use their electronic devices on the planes during takeoff, it literally doesn't do anything and is just some safety relic from an age past)

[wanderingfool2]

2 hours ago, whispous said:

Turns out that their message is wrong, and they do not ban Airtags. The battery inside an airtag is not classified the same as other banned items.

He's apparently an aviation analyst, who did things for BBC and such...and yet he jumps on it being because of lithium and not the wireless...he must be such a great analyst /s  The fact is there are multiple tweets referring to it being banned (he claims they are removed but I can see all of them still)...so I trust it from the source (ie the company who is getting tons of bad press but still tweeting about it).

 

 

On a side note, I know that lost luggage is still ultimately the airlines fault, but is it realistically?  I know some airports aside from the initial labelling of the bag, the airport itself is the one who has hired the baggage handlers and are responsible for getting to to the plane.  After arrival the airport handlers ensure it gets to the proper gate.  While it still falls on the airlines, there's quite a bit where it could be the airports fault.  Or is Germany different?  I'm not sure, where the airlines are fully responsible for the employees who load/unload.

[aisle9]

3 hours ago, Lightwreather JfromN said:

But… How are they planning on enforcing this?

According to what I know, it's small and and afaik has not triggered any Baggage scanner. But I could be wrong and it would be interesting if anyone has had a contrary experience.

Passenger: "My luggage isn't lost! It's in Sorebuttistan! I can see it right here!"

Lufthansa: "Oh, can you now?"

 

3 hours ago, jagdtigger said:

I wonder if ppl could sue them for theft because they falsely reporting the luggage as lost when in reality they have them in their possession.....

Sorta kinda but not really. Airlines in the US are limited in the amount of damages they're liable for when it comes to your baggage. I think it's around $5,000, but it might have come down. Basically the way it works here is that if your baggage doesn't arrive at the airport when you do, you go and file a report and inventory with the airline onsite. 99% of the time, this results in your baggage being thrown at your front door at 4:00 AM by an airline employee who resents the fact that his job consists of throwing lost luggage at its owners at 4:00 AM. Most airlines will give you a baggage allowance of up to $75 per day for lost luggage so you can buy things like clothing, toiletries, whatever else you could reasonably need. No squatting on the allowance for 3 days so you can buy a Chromebook.

 

Airlines have a pretty long stretch of time to find your baggage before it's officially considered lost. If it doesn't turn up within that window, odds are it was sold off at a lost luggage auction (yep, that's a thing). If that happens, you're free to negotiate compensation with them based upon what you said you had in your bag. If you're completely unhappy with what they offer and they won't budge to where you are, sure, you can sue. Just remember that jurisdictional rules could come into play, and it's illegal to tell a court that you have a priceless Picasso in there when really it's just a change of underwear, a toothbrush and a spare phone charger. And good luck convincing a court that your underpants, toothbrush and USB charger are worth $5,000. Oh, and this might all be moot if there's an arbitration clause buried in the ticket's terms somewhere. I don't know if that's allowed, but if it is, airlines would be nuts not to do it. Arbitration is quiet and a stacked deck in their favor, but that's a discussion for another thread.

 

1 minute ago, wanderingfool2 said:

On a side note, I know that lost luggage is still ultimately the airlines fault, but is it realistically?

In the US, yes. Your baggage is in the custody of the airline, even if it's airport contractors and employees handling it. As such, if it's damaged or lost, it's on them.

[Forbidden Wafer]

5 hours ago, Lightwreather JfromN said:

But… How are they planning on enforcing this?

According to what I know, it's small and and afaik has not triggered any Baggage scanner. But I could be wrong and it would be interesting if anyone has had a contrary experience.

20-30 bucks for a radio detector.

[wanderingfool2]

1 hour ago, aisle9 said:

In the US, yes. Your baggage is in the custody of the airline, even if it's airport contractors and employees handling it. As such, if it's damaged or lost, it's on them.

I know that it is still the airlines fault, but to an extent it should be wrong to blanketly blame them if the majority of the time it's caused by airport employees which they are required to use

[aisle9]

7 minutes ago, wanderingfool2 said:

I know that it is still the airlines fault, but to an extent it should be wrong to blanketly blame them if the majority of the time it's caused by airport employees which they are required to use

Most major airports are very, very automated at this point. It's automatically sorted belts instead of luggage handlers throwing stuff around.

[jagdtigger]

1 hour ago, aisle9 said:

Sorta kinda but not really.

Thats just stupid...

[BlueChinchillaEatingDorito]

Remember when Lufthansa used to be a world class airline? And now their service and physical product went down the shitter, plus this. 

[Kisai]

5 hours ago, Eigenvektor said:

Unlikely, that would require people to prove that Lufthansa intentionally lost their stuff in an attempt to enrich themselves. (I mean people could certainly sue them, it's just costly and unlikely to be met with success)

 

The luggage is probably just stuck somewhere in the underbelly of the airport and it's not cost effective to send people crawling through there in search of lost luggage, potentially stopping working machines and so on.

People have used the tags to point the fingers at baggage thieves (employed by the airline) too. 

 

My personal opinion is that Lufthansa is only slightly in the right. If their policy is no electronics at all (not even the pilots) then sure. But if the pilots and crew are using electronics during take off and landing, then clearly the policy against electronics doesn't exist, or isn't enforced except to beat up customers with it by people who should have been fired by the airline for having making, let alone enforcing the policy at all.

 

I'm more inclined to say that the air tags are rightfully being used for their intended purpose (the customer finding their bag in the airport) and if Apple wanted to give some extra room to prevent it from being active during flight, allow the owners of the tags to be able to "sleep" the tag until the flight is over, eg you have a 4 hour flight expected to land at 8pm, you tell the iphone the time you're expected to land, and it will tell the tag to sleep until 8:02pm. 

 

But hey, if Lufthansa is gonna do this, expect other airlines to oblige. Can't expect to have your luggage transferred between flights if the rules are different.

 

[Eigenvektor]

14 minutes ago, Kisai said:

My personal opinion is that Lufthansa is only slightly in the right. If their policy is no electronics at all (not even the pilots) then sure.

Their policy is no active electronics in checked-in luggage. You can still take electronics like your phone into the cabin with you. As far as I know this is not a new policy. For example you generally need to take out removable batteries from a laptop that is in your luggage. You are fine to bring one on board and use it.

 

14 minutes ago, Kisai said:

But if the pilots and crew are using electronics during take off and landing, then clearly the policy against electronics doesn't exist, or isn't enforced except to beat up customers with it by people who should have been fired by the airline for having making, let alone enforcing the policy at all.

They're only asking you to turn devices into flight mode during take off and landing, you're otherwise fine to use them. You're also assuming pilot and crew aren't only using electronics that have been checked to ensure they do not interfere with normal operation during that time. To add, pilots are actually forbidden from using personal electronic devices during flight, because it can serve as a distraction.

 

14 minutes ago, Kisai said:

I'm more inclined to say that the air tags are rightfully being used for their intended purpose (the customer finding their bag in the airport) and if Apple wanted to give some extra room to prevent it from being active during flight, allow the owners of the tags to be able to "sleep" the tag until the flight is over, eg you have a 4 hour flight expected to land at 8pm, you tell the iphone the time you're expected to land, and it will tell the tag to sleep until 8:02pm.

That's a pretty sound idea actually. ~edit: of course you need to take into account possible delays.

[aisle9]

22 minutes ago, BlueChinchillaEatingDorito said:

Remember when Lufthansa used to be a world class airline? And now their service and physical product went down the shitter, plus this. 

I wasn't around in 1960.

[Thaldor]

3 hours ago, wanderingfool2 said:

On a side note, I know that lost luggage is still ultimately the airlines fault, but is it realistically?  I know some airports aside from the initial labelling of the bag, the airport itself is the one who has hired the baggage handlers and are responsible for getting to to the plane.  After arrival the airport handlers ensure it gets to the proper gate.  While it still falls on the airlines, there's quite a bit where it could be the airports fault.  Or is Germany different?  I'm not sure, where the airlines are fully responsible for the employees who load/unload.

While in practice it is airports fault, the airline most likely has 100 times better chances to solve the issue with the airport through their contacts and to be quicker to give their customer compensation and later request that back from the airport. Just like with any consumer product and their warranties (at least in EU) the retailer is primary obligated to deal with the warranty for the consumer and it is then between the retailer and the manufacturer/wholesaler to deal with the rest.

[Ydfhlx]

6 hours ago, TetraSky said:

That make SO much sense to do... How are they even allowed to operate with such a horrible mindset.

National airlines in Europe are regularly bailed out by respective governments or most of them would collapse. Some of them actually have in spite of the bailouts.

[TetraSky]

15 minutes ago, Ydfhlx said:

National airlines in Europe are regularly bailed out by respective governments or most of them would collapse. Some of them actually have in spite of the bailouts.

So not too different than Air Canada. Bailed them out, then the execs gave themselves some nice bonuses.

[SansVarnic]

I dont see how airlines can ban something that is passive tech and how would they even know the tags were in the luggage? Lol. Idiocracy at its finest.

Competition needs to be allowed in the airline industry, lets those that can handle the job fail and die and those that do know how to handle the industry flourish.

[wanderingfool2]

5 hours ago, SansVarnic said:

I dont see how airlines can ban something that is passive tech and how would they even know the tags were in the luggage? Lol. Idiocracy at its finest.

Competition needs to be allowed in the airline industry, lets those that can handle the job fail and die and those that do know how to handle the industry flourish.

Airtags aren't strictly passive.  They don't connect to the internet, but they still emit bluetooth EMF signals.  Don't get me wrong, it's still stupid banning airtags because they obviously haven't interfered with communications yet and it really appears as though it's out of a reactionary thing...but with that said, if lets say they are in an area where communication is poor and needed that last extra bit or lets say ground radar...all it needs is a bag placed in the really wrong place.  Not saying that this is a thing...but I mean they were worried enough when 5G cell towers were becoming a thing.

 

Also, "competition needs to be allowed in the airline industry".  I'd argue the amount of airlines is too many and the incessant need to push down prices has really messed things up so much (on top of airport fees they are required to pay).  Economical airlines typically don't make money, and a few bad incidents can effectively kill any profit they do make.

 

Where the money is at are the large airports, they pull in so much money (they are almost as bad as Ticketmaster for the amount of stuff they charge airlines and customers through processing fees).

 

10 hours ago, Kisai said:

But if the pilots and crew are using electronics during take off and landing, then clearly the policy against electronics doesn't exist, or isn't enforced except to beat up customers with it by people who should have been fired by the airline for having making, let alone enforcing the policy at all.

Cell phones and things are supposed to be switched to airplane mode during landing and takeoff.  Also the crew and pilots would be using authorized devices, which would be operating on known quantities.

[leadeater]

18 minutes ago, wanderingfool2 said:

Cell phones and things are supposed to be switched to airplane mode during landing and takeoff.  Also the crew and pilots would be using authorized devices, which would be operating on known quantities.

Well lets not forget that Cellphones and other wireless devices on these radio bands don't and can't actually cause any problems, has been tested and proven to death at this point. The only reason why Airplane mode is still a thing and still highly advised is "just in case" that one in a trillion off chance that might somehow cause a problem. Talking about large commercial aircraft here btw (and high end private too).

 

Of course I do actually switch my phone to Airplane mode, usually completely off, because no point not doing so. But it's not like I don't know that the whole thing is performance theatre and nothing else.

 

So the RF/EMI reasoning is nothing more than a farce. Every airline and airport should want tracking tags in everything, because mistakes and issues happen so if you know where everything is at all times and who's it's supposed to be it helps everyone equally and will actually improve these types of problems.

 

RFID tags can be printed now days, checked baggage should all just have this as part of the baggage tag. We have the technology, sighhhhh.