The only real question is - can I explicitly disable airtag tracking on my iPhone
And a follow-up if the answer is yes: can you still be notified that someone is using an AirTag to stalk you if you do so?
An update on AirTag and unwanted tracking
351–360 of 508 posts
Re: An update on AirTag and unwanted tracking
#352Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I was driving and we left without recognizing that a few hundred dollars of keys had been lost. What do you mean by "a few hundred dollars of keys?" Do hardware stores charge more than a few dollars per key in your area? Were these private keys to a crypto wallet?
Proximity key fobs at $100+ each and programming which can run $80-100 each, a few house keys (I change the locks of keys have been out of my control in a way that can plausibly be tied to my identity, lest someone make a copy and turn up uninvited - that’s another $100+), and $30 for an air tag. I didn’t make up those numbers.
Oh wow, I thought maybe it was a typo. Thanks for the details!
Re: An update on AirTag and unwanted tracking
#353Android users are still vulnerable, and these announcements do nothing to reduce that. All a stalker needs to do, is remove the speaker. To detect a rogue AirTag, an Android owner needs to: 1) know AirTags exist (many obviously don't) 2) go out of their way to install Apple's Android AirTag scanner app (only 100k-500k worldwide have done so according to Google Play stats) 3) manually open the scanner app and scan, si…
> And since most lost items turn into stolen items after a few hours
Is that a feeling or something you can source?
Re: An update on AirTag and unwanted tracking
#354Are airtags still useful for eg. tracking a stolen bike? Or will it now alert the thief within minutes that the bike contains a tracker?
Airtags were never supposed to be used to track stolen things, but to retrieve lost things. People complaining about airtags being nerfed were misusing them in the first place
> People complaining about airtags being nerfed were misusing them in the first place
I sense the "you're holding it wrong" philosophy never really changed at Apple.
Re: An update on AirTag and unwanted tracking
#355Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I was driving and we left without recognizing that a few hundred dollars of keys had been lost. What do you mean by "a few hundred dollars of keys?" Do hardware stores charge more than a few dollars per key in your area? Were these private keys to a crypto wallet?
Do hardware stores charge more than a few dollars per key in your area? A replacement key for my wife's car costs $1,200. And it's not even a newer, or expensive car. It's been a long time since you could get many car keys done at a hardware store. And it's not even the electronics anymore. One locksmith I called said it's about the fancy engraving. They can't afford the tools to do that kind of work, and they just r…
Curious which manufacturer... Porsche or Audi?
Re: An update on AirTag and unwanted tracking
#356Earlier quoted context omitted.
Proximity key fobs at $100+ each and programming which can run $80-100 each, a few house keys (I change the locks of keys have been out of my control in a way that can plausibly be tied to my identity, lest someone make a copy and turn up uninvited - that’s another $100+), and $30 for an air tag. I didn’t make up those numbers.
Oh wow, I thought maybe it was a typo. Thanks for the details!
Yeah - I learned the hard way a while back when someone in our household misplaced another key… and found it right after we’d replaced it/paid all that.
Re: An update on AirTag and unwanted tracking
#357Earlier quoted context omitted.
Wow. Not disagreeing with or commenting on that policy at all, but I had no idea knives were treated so seriously in the UK (and presumably elsewhere). Meanwhile in much of the US, not only can you can openly carry a gun around, you don’t even need a permit. Just wow. The world is vast and strange.
The Brits don't have a 2A. We have it because of the Brits. Life isn't that strange if you follow it back. They have knife bans because they never let their citizens have guns, so there are knife attacks, so they ban knives. That's why terrorists when they can't sneak AK47s in, rely on vans to run people over, that's why there are bollards everywhere. Chemical attacks, axes and such can also be used to kill or harm p…
I agree with you, but note that NYC (a frequent point of comparison with London, despite stats incompatibilities) has more knife murders than London, ie their second biggest category is bigger than our first category of murders by weapon. https://www.euronews.com/2019/06/18/deadly-knife-crime-how-d...
Re: An update on AirTag and unwanted tracking
#358Earlier quoted context omitted.
Trackers have been around for years . Tile came out in 2014, and Samsung has their own Galaxy tracker line for a while now. Neither have anti-stalking features of any kind to this day. If one was stuck on your car, you wouldn't get an alert or any info on who placed it there, be you an iPhone user or an Android user. And before that, there were GPS trackers which have bigger batteries and were more accurate (if a bit…
> But Apple apparently has done it with anti-stalking features but is too high-profile. Remember that stalking isn't a profession; it's often a crime of opportunity, with plenty of reported cases of e.g. people slipping GPS trackers into spouses' cars/bags before or during divorces. Those people aren't sophisticated, and might go on Amazon and see Tiles that won't work (sparse detection network), or GPS trackers that…
It's all adding up to a pretty good guerilla marketing campaign. Get an iPhone, or else.
Every Android user needs Airguard, which will scan constantly for airtags. It's open source
Re: An update on AirTag and unwanted tracking
#359Earlier quoted context omitted.
How expensive is your umbrella? Just curious.
$50-ish — but that's not the point. I value my belongings because I spend great deal of time researching and finding products that I love using day in day out (unlike most people who constantly curse at stuff they have). I also modify things I buy to fine tune it to my needs. So even a $50 umbrella is more like $1000 in terms of time I've spent on it and I have no intention of doing it again. This particular umbrella…
Please create or point me to your product review site!
Re: An update on AirTag and unwanted tracking
#360Android users are still vulnerable, and these announcements do nothing to reduce that. All a stalker needs to do, is remove the speaker. To detect a rogue AirTag, an Android owner needs to: 1) know AirTags exist (many obviously don't) 2) go out of their way to install Apple's Android AirTag scanner app (only 100k-500k worldwide have done so according to Google Play stats) 3) manually open the scanner app and scan, si…
>I continue to think Apple should have never released AirTags to the public
It is the usual Apple strategy for decades. AirTags product play was the technological groundwork for UWB and possibly AR/VR. They always need a product, hobby or something adjacent to iron out all the problems. Chip Packaging, Next Gen OLED, Low Power Profiling all landed on Apple Watch first before they moved to iPhone. The Sound work on AirPod before they moved to HomePod and later MacBook and iPad.
This way they could spread their R&D and gain synergy across product range.
On the subject of tracking, I am not entirely sure AirTag, or the idea of Tagging ( so to speak ) is as useless as you claim it to be, but I am also extremely uneasy with the concept of AirTag. Like many if not all things in life, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.