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Find My Device on Android

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Re: Find My Device on Android

#161

Post by foooorsyth »

joe5150 wrote: post #95
foooorsyth wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AirTags are not better in one very important way: they don't prevent theft. They will notify thieves that they are hidden in a valuable item that they are stealing if the thief carries an iPhone. Tile has a feature where you can submit your info and sign some sort of extra contract stating that you won't use your Tile for stalking/illegal activity, and you can actually hide a Tile in your bike frame and it can be use…

How do hidden trackers "prevent" theft? If a thief steals your bike and is notified that it's being tracked, they're probably much more likely to abandon it somewhere, at which point you can recover it. This seems like a safer bet than trying to hunt them down yourself. (It should go without saying the police are not going to go get your bicycle back for you even if you do hand them the GPS coordinates.)

It’s a massive deterrence. LoJack has been in business since 1986 for a reason.

Also, the attitude of “don’t go and get your stuff back yourself, it’s not safe” is just castrated cowardice and only emboldens thieves. Thieves should be afraid of both law enforcement and vigilante response. Better society when both are on the table.

Re: Find My Device on Android

#162

Post by e44858 »

amluto wrote: post #9

Google is quite good at these little screw-you features: > At home protection. If a user has chosen to save their home address in their Google Account, their Android device will also ensure that it does not contribute crowdsourced location reports to the Find My Device network when it is near the user’s home. This is a feature that is fundamentally on-device, and it’s even a privacy feature, but for some reason it re…

Does any part of Find My work without a Google account?

Re: Find My Device on Android

#163

Post by Aerbil313 »

nolist_policy wrote: post #115
TheSkyHasEyes wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The if here is some phones can be turned off and not transmit anything, at all.

Modems are usually directly connected to the battery rail, because (so the saying goes) they have high peak power consumption.

I once built a cell phone from scratch. They do have high peak power consumption, and I did connect it to the battery rail directly, along with some capacitors to handle the surges.

Re: Find My Device on Android

#164

Post by lupire »

foooorsyth wrote: post #161
joe5150 wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do hidden trackers "prevent" theft? If a thief steals your bike and is notified that it's being tracked, they're probably much more likely to abandon it somewhere, at which point you can recover it. This seems like a safer bet than trying to hunt them down yourself. (It should go without saying the police are not going to go get your bicycle back for you even if you do hand them the GPS coordinates.)

It’s a massive deterrence. LoJack has been in business since 1986 for a reason. Also, the attitude of “don’t go and get your stuff back yourself, it’s not safe” is just castrated cowardice and only emboldens thieves. Thieves should be afraid of both law enforcement and vigilante response. Better society when both are on the table.

How does an anti-theft tech that know one knows is there deter anything?

Cars are frequently stolen, as you may have noticed.

Re: Find My Device on Android

#165

Post by lupire »

jsheard wrote: post #30
robotnikman wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So Airtags work with android now?

No, the AirTag ecosystem and Google Find My ecosystem are still separate things. Google and Apple did cooperate to standardize stalker detection though, so your iPhone will alert you if you have an unknown Google tag following you, or vice versa if your Android phone notices an unknown AirTag.

Low hanging fruit for EU antitrust enforcement.

Re: Find My Device on Android

#166

Post by lupire »

nradov wrote: post #100
tivert wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article linked there has a few more details about the implementation: https://www.androidpolice.com/android-15-powered-off-finding... : > To solve this problem, Google is working on a “Powered Off Finding” feature that allows a device to store precomputed Bluetooth beacons in the memory of the Bluetooth controller. This means that even when a device is powered off, it can continue broadcasting Bluetooth beacons t…

There is mostly dead and then there is all dead. A battery which is unable to supply enough power to keep the entire phone operating can likely supply enough for just the Bluetooth chip. Of course, the resulting deep discharge may damage the battery chemistry.

We've discovered the mythical "unlimited". Unlimited Bluetooth power :-)

Re: Find My Device on Android

#167

Post by amluto »

e44858 wrote: post #162
amluto wrote: post #9

Google is quite good at these little screw-you features: > At home protection. If a user has chosen to save their home address in their Google Account, their Android device will also ensure that it does not contribute crowdsourced location reports to the Find My Device network when it is near the user’s home. This is a feature that is fundamentally on-device, and it’s even a privacy feature, but for some reason it re…

Does any part of Find My work without a Google account?

That’s a fair question — if your phone doesn’t report beacons without a Google account, then requiring a Google account to mask off areas isn’t so bad. But you should still be able to mask off areas without telling Google your home address.

Re: Find My Device on Android

#168

Post by foooorsyth »

lupire wrote: post #164
foooorsyth wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a massive deterrence. LoJack has been in business since 1986 for a reason. Also, the attitude of “don’t go and get your stuff back yourself, it’s not safe” is just castrated cowardice and only emboldens thieves. Thieves should be afraid of both law enforcement and vigilante response. Better society when both are on the table.

How does an anti-theft tech that know one knows is there deter anything? Cars are frequently stolen, as you may have noticed.

Thieves will begin to expect it to be there some of the time, after sufficient police/vigilante response. And perhaps it will be hard to find. Hence, deterrence.

Cars are stolen far less often than they would be otherwise partially due to technology like LoJack. Did you grow up in the US? Steering wheel locks used to be on every other parked car. Immobilizers and LoJack made them a thing you buy for your weekend classic car only.

Re: Find My Device on Android

#169

Post by saurik »

jsheard wrote: post #83
saurik wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AirTags only come in a single size and shape that only makes sense for larger container objects. Tile makes a flat credit-card sized variant that you can slide in your wallet, and the adapters required to put an AirTag on a keychain is pretty ridiculous in comparison to the tiny variants you can get from Tile with a built-in hole for this purpose. (Also: AFAIK the "large"--not really, in comparison to the AirTag + ad…

Unfortunately the wallet trackers are compromised by the fact that most nice wallets come with RFID (and BLE) blocking linings nowadays... Hang onto your old RF-transparent wallet, because RFID blocking has become a standard bullet-point feature they all have to have now.

I had found what I consider to be the perfect wallet and while they did add an RFID lining it was one I could remove. I have bought multiple of them as backups and likely will purchase a few more ;P.
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