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I used Apple AirTags, Tiles and a GPS tracker to watch my husband’s every move

nytimes.com

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Re: I used Apple AirTags, Tiles and a GPS tracker to watch my husband’s every move

#141

Post by xeromal »

hnlmorg wrote: post #36

Can someone explain to me (because I cannot work it myself) why everyone is suddenly worried about AirTags yet these kinds of devices have been around for a while (eg the Samsung Galaxy SmartTag was released last year and little was talked about it). And GPS tracking isn't even a new thing either. So why is it most conversations focus on the AirTag? What is it that the AirTag does better/worse/differently to the othe…

Because Samsung or Tile is a subset of a subset compared to Apple. When apple does something, hundreds of millions of people are instantly involved. The scale is what matters.

Re: I used Apple AirTags, Tiles and a GPS tracker to watch my husband’s every move

#142

Post by xeromal »

kelnos wrote: post #129
ezfe wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

does this distinction matter at all, in any way to the point they were trying to get across?

If someone is going to write an article about tracking and surveillance, to me it reduces their credibility if they don't understand something very basic about how GPS works. It makes me wonder what else they got wrong in the article, and whether or not I should trust their overall conclusions. This might not matter to you, and that's fine; it does matter to me.

But she's not giving a technical analysis of GPS. She's a wife tracking her husband. For that scenario, her understanding is good enough.

Re: I used Apple AirTags, Tiles and a GPS tracker to watch my husband’s every move

#143

Post by dekhn »

secabeen wrote: post #114
dekhn wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

baby-hospital visits are brutal. It's about 8 hours of waiting (usually in the middle of the night) with a screaming child while staff ignores you and then finally says there isn't a problem. Recently during a bout of covid my son's tongue was blue and he couldn't figure out what was up. My wife wanted to the go to ER, the doctor said to go to the ER. I said, "no, there's another explanation for this and nobody is lo…

> baby-hospital visits are brutal. It's about 8 hours of waiting (usually in the middle of the night) with a screaming child while staff ignores you and then finally says there isn't a problem. Add to that that depending on your health-care plan, it could cost you thousands of dollars!

Personally, I could care less about the cost (but it does bother me). IO should have mentioned above that in nearly all cases, urgent care is more appropriate (my provider has one open during daytime hours).

Re: I used Apple AirTags, Tiles and a GPS tracker to watch my husband’s every move

#144

Post by r00fus »

johnwalkr wrote: post #71

I understand the negative points about airtags, and one negative point I thought of but never see mentioned is the fact that all iphones are opted in by default to use battery life and data (however little) to operate the findmy network. In fact not many non-tech people realize that a) airtags work globally, not just near your iphone and b) relay data through any nearby iphone and not somehow directly to apple. Peopl…

> I used one when shipping an important, time sensitive and expensive item to a client. It was a huge value compared to the usual tracking of packages.

Imagine this included as part of shipping. Vendor puts an airtag (or equivalent commercial item) and once you receive, you "turn off" this tracking device (with a code or NFC) confirming receipt of the package, either disabling the device or enabling it for another (return?) shipping request.

Ideally, eventually legislation will exist to constrain the capabilities of such trackers. With the current state of Congress I'm not sure this will happen at a federal level in the US.

Re: I used Apple AirTags, Tiles and a GPS tracker to watch my husband’s every move

#145

Post by KyleJune »

supergeek wrote: post #99
gwbas1c wrote: post #29

I often peek at my wife when she's coming home from work via our car's app. She knows I do this. (When my kids are with me they love watching the car move on the map. I hope she peeks at me when she's with the kids and I have the car.) What made it funny one time was when I was between jobs, and she went to her gynecologist after work. Even though she told me, I forgot, and the map only showed that there was a divorc…

Yeah, it's been very surprising as a Tesla owner to learn that there's no way to opt-out of this tracking in the car. Your location is always relayed to the app, and your only option is to log out of your account in the car, which still relays the data to Tesla for the super paranoid.

Only people with access to your Tesla account can access location information. The information is limited, you just see where the vehicle is at live, not a history of where it has been. You can opt out of people being able to check your location via the app. You can just go to the Safety & Security settings on the display in your car and turn off Mobile Access.

Re: I used Apple AirTags, Tiles and a GPS tracker to watch my husband’s every move

#146

Post by Klonoar »

crhulls wrote: post #110
Klonoar wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a slightly unrelated question about Life360. When Life360 sold Couple in 2016, did it sell all the data that users had stored up to that point as well? As best I can tell it was announced via tweet and sold to what looked like a 1-person dev shop. Myself and a number of others who used to use the app have often wondered this[1]. If I’m incorrect on anything in this article I would be happy to edit it, but I’d…

We sold the app in its entirety, which did include data, to a startup run by a former employee. It didn't really get going and the servers are all wound down, so I assume the data is gone into the ether for good (I am 90% confident on this last point - I will confirm).

The confirmation would be greatly appreciated. :)

Would you also be comfortable with me linking to this discussion/comment on that post as a 2022 edit? I still get people emailing me asking if anything was ever determined on it.

Re: I used Apple AirTags, Tiles and a GPS tracker to watch my husband’s every move

#147

Post by acomjean »

hnrodey wrote: post #108
acomjean wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah. I took my partners dog for the afternoon. It has an airtag (not an official supported use). I knew the dog had it but there was some comment made about our walk. Monitoring by proxy. When I worked at a power monitoring startup (we monitored home power use, by individual circuit) this passive monitoring came up. And our CEO mentioned to his wife that she was home early.. "how did you know?" He saw the garage doo…

Care to share the competitors in the power monitoring space? I could really use a solution to this because my home electric bill is crazy high. We moved in to a new house about eight months ago and this electric bill is like 30% higher than my previous home. Not just the raw total of the bill - my consumption is higher in this house. I know of sense.com but perhaps there are others?

Our product was "site sage". Its subscription based and you have to install a current transformer around each circuit coming out of you electric box (you'd install in the circuit breaker box). But you did get circuit by circuit listings. Its also subscription based. The company has moved on to monitoring kitchen equipment, though they still sell them.

I've been out of the space for a while, but the "sense" power monitor was new when I left. It claims to use AI so you can just monitor the mains and it will suss out what is using power.

There were a lot of our home customers who were very obsessed with power use (trying to get to net 0 with solar). There have to be forums for this...

If you are looking for the manual way. getting a kill-o-watt and attaching it to your outlet is one way to see one of the things that takes a lot of power. I have the "Belkin" version which I like because the display isn't near the outlet. I'd suggest fridge... In my case my fridge was a large % of my power bill. Any electric heat.

https://www.belkin.com/au/support-article?articleNum=5381

Re: I used Apple AirTags, Tiles and a GPS tracker to watch my husband’s every move

#148

Post by crhulls »

rootusrootus wrote: post #127
crhulls wrote: post #88

Hi All, I'm the cofounder and CEO of Life360, which is the relatively new owner of Tile. Stalking hasn't been much of an issue for us, but we are in the process expanding the finding network via our 35 million+ active user base (will require opt-in consent) and we also do offer a location device for kids and pets (Jiobit) that has its own cell connection which is actually meant for finding people in real-time. We hav…

I am a mostly happy user of Life360, not currently paying (but I have in the past). I would be more likely to pay real money for the service if it came with a contractual guarantee that by paying for it, my data would never get sold. Not even in aggregate, 'anonymized'. I like the service, I'm willing to be a customer, but I hate the privacy leak.

We are now on record that data from Tile and Jiobit will NEVER be sold. Period. Some of the other stuff on our data practices were highly sensationalized, and we have a privacy center that allows any user - free or paid - to opt in/out of any portion of our platform they don't like, even ads within the system. So this is something you absolutely don't need to worry about.

Re: I used Apple AirTags, Tiles and a GPS tracker to watch my husband’s every move

#149

Post by lostlogin »

boopmaster wrote: post #27
rustybolt wrote: post #23

> All these people received warnings on their iPhones, a feature Apple had built into the AirTag system to help prevent unwanted tracking. So if you don't have an iPhone, enjoy being stalked!

I stalk iPhone users with Tiles

No you don't. Their CEO is here saying that doesn't happen. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30305461

Re: I used Apple AirTags, Tiles and a GPS tracker to watch my husband’s every move

#150

Post by crhulls »

nostromo wrote: post #134
rootusrootus wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a mostly happy user of Life360, not currently paying (but I have in the past). I would be more likely to pay real money for the service if it came with a contractual guarantee that by paying for it, my data would never get sold. Not even in aggregate, 'anonymized'. I like the service, I'm willing to be a customer, but I hate the privacy leak.

Consider just using AirTags then if you can. It’s built such that Apple can’t even read the location data, and it’s a onetime cost. The value prop is much nicer for someone that cares about privacy.

It is a much longer topic but there is some irony that privacy allows Apple and other giant platforms full use of 1st party data however they want. If we are worried about the hive mind (I am personally not) the attention needs to be on the big news and social media networks.
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