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Apple and Google last year jointly announced a proposed industry specification to help combat the misuse of Bluetooth item trackers for unwanted tracking of individuals. As part of this initiative, Apple promised to expand AirTag-like "Found Moving With You" alerts to third-party item trackers in a future software update, which may be iOS 17.5.

AirTag-and-iPhone-Notification-Feature.jpg

MacRumors contributor Steve Moser uncovered several new references to alerts for third-party item trackers in the first beta of iOS 17.5, released this week. For example: "You can disable this item and stop it from sharing its location with the owner. To do this, follow the instructions provided on a website by the manufacturer of this item."

Tile, Chipolo, Samsung, Eufy, and Pebblebee all expressed support for the industry specification, according to Apple's announcement last year.

iOS 17.5 is expected to be released to the public in May.

Article Link: iOS 17.5 Might Expand 'Found Moving With You' Alerts to Third-Party Item Trackers
 
I haven't looked into this in any detail.... but like the comment above... surely what the article implies is that, yes, a thief could stop you, the owner, tracking your stolen property. 😂

I hope there is more to this...

I think these trackers are so common now, that most thieves in the know will have a quick look for any... and just throw it in a trash can. I wonder how many AirTags have ended up in landfill already 🤔

On another concern... I do hope they come up with a better power solution for these... 1 years worth of tacking per coin cell... we should be eliminating these batteries... not making more devices that use them. They really need to develop a long lasting rechargeable battery that is certified safe for air travel etc.
 
So if someone steals my checked luggage (which has a tracker), the thief will get a notice and instructions on how to stop me from tracking my bag?? I hope I'm missing something.
Rather the other way around. Someone is slipping this into your pocket to find out where your live, your habbits and stalking you. Not something pleasant, especially for those vulnerable or in abusive relationships.
 
Rather the other way around. Someone is slipping this into your pocket to find out where your live, your habbits and stalking you. Not something pleasant, especially for those vulnerable or in abusive relationships.
They can indeed be used for this purpose... but this happens anyway... people follow each other, people can buy other trackers... even slip a spare phone in someone's bag and track that.

AirTag just made it much cheaper and easier.
 
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Rather the other way around. Someone is slipping this into your pocket to find out where your live, your habbits and stalking you. Not something pleasant, especially for those vulnerable or in abusive relationships.
Highly unlikely. Its silly to handicap the Main Feature of a product to accomodate an unlikely misusage of the product. Whoever pushes this silly argument needs to get a reality check.
 
So if someone steals my checked luggage (which has a tracker), the thief will get a notice and instructions on how to stop me from tracking my bag?? I hope I'm missing something.
I’d assume if you put it into lost mode or something like that it would behave differently.
 
It seems we will get this alert whenever we ride a bus, metro, train, etc next to other passengers who also have airtags...
 
So if someone steals my checked luggage (which has a tracker), the thief will get a notice and instructions on how to stop me from tracking my bag?? I hope I'm missing something.
Yeah, and while I'm sitting on the plane am I going to get notifications for a 100 bags that are following me in the baggage compartment?
 
Yeah, and while I'm sitting on the plane am I going to get notifications for a 100 bags that are following me in the baggage compartment?
If you have 100 bags following you in the baggage compartment.... an AIrTag would be the least of my concerns...

This is the thing of nightmares. Especially if you have to run, once off the plane.. to get away from that baggage following you around.

This is why you should always avoid people with baggage.
 
So if someone steals my checked luggage (which has a tracker), the thief will get a notice and instructions on how to stop me from tracking my bag?? I hope I'm missing something.
Macrumors only shared parts of the actual string which makes this completely misleading. Other sites report the full string as:

This item isn’t certified on the Apple Find My network. You can disable this item and stop it from sharing its location with the owner. To do this, follow the instructions provided on a website by the manufacturer of this item“

The first sentence makes all the difference. This is only about uncertified 3rd party trackers. Not actual AirTags or other certified Find My accessories.
 
So if someone steals my checked luggage (which has a tracker), the thief will get a notice and instructions on how to stop me from tracking my bag?? I hope I'm missing something.

Rather the other way around. Someone is slipping this into your pocket to find out where your live, your habbits and stalking you. Not something pleasant, especially for those vulnerable or in abusive relationships.

This product has a fundamental problem. People want to use it for two mutually exclusive cases. Apple has to do absolutely everything they can to prevent people being tracked without their permission because people are already blowing the stalking aspect way out of proportion. Thieves don't want to be tracked, either. So it's an unsolvable problem.

I say this as someone personally aware of a case where an AirTag was used for stalking. That was one of many items on this person's long list of offenses. This person abused everything at their disposal including AirTags. Nobody can stop people abusing legitimate items. Everything is a weapon, as they say.

All Apple can do is officially declare them to be not for tracking stolen items, and be seen to be as anti-stalker as possible, because we live in history's most litigious society.
 
This product has a fundamental problem. People want to use it for two mutually exclusive cases. Apple has to do absolutely everything they can to prevent people being tracked without their permission because people are already blowing the stalking aspect way out of proportion. Thieves don't want to be tracked, either. So it's an unsolvable problem.

I say this as someone personally aware of a case where an AirTag was used for stalking. Trust me, that was one of many items on this person's long list of offenses. This person abused everything at their disposal including AirTags. Nobody can stop people abusing legitimate items. Everything is a weapon, as they say.

All Apple can do is officially declare them to be not for tracking stolen items, and be seen to be as anti-stalker as possible, because we live in history's most litigious society.
I think they are stuck in a hard place with this.... but like anything any business sells... its products and services can be used for good or bad.

It's like a car company telling a customer they really shouldn't run over people. A kitchen utensils company telling a customer they shouldn't attack people.

Some things just require common sense... and we need good law enforcement and justice system to deal with the bad people who use everyday items.
 
I think they are stuck in a hard place with this.... but like anything any business sells... its products and services can be used for good or bad.

It's like a car company telling a customer they really shouldn't run over people. A kitchen utensils company telling a customer they shouldn't attack people.

Some things just require common sense... and we need good law enforcement and justice system to deal with the bad people who use everyday items.

All comes back to user education and mental health. Mandate driver's ed.

Not sure what one can do about the kitchen knives. Marriage counseling, maybe. Half sarcastically.
 
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Apple continues to be the white knight on airtags, almost completely ruining the purpose of a tracker in order to appease the 0.01% of people that were stalked in the first month of their existence. And everyone consistently around one of your tagged items continually gets the "found moving with you" alerts, which is a menace.

You have a short time to recover your item before the thief gets a warning and gets a shot at finding the airtag.
 
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Highly unlikely. Its silly to handicap the Main Feature of a product to accomodate an unlikely misusage of the product. Whoever pushes this silly argument needs to get a reality check.
Please read the news, say NY Times. Whether it's auto theft blowing up or abusive ex-boyfriends, the sad reality is that creeps find AirTags to be quite useful (for misuse).
 
That'd be great.
One of the reasons I love using apple products so much.
I'm in so specific stalking danger, but I'd seriously like to be notified if an airtag is moving with me.
 
I think they are stuck in a hard place with this.... but like anything any business sells... its products and services can be used for good or bad.

It's like a car company telling a customer they really shouldn't run over people. A kitchen utensils company telling a customer they shouldn't attack people.

Some things just require common sense... and we need good law enforcement and justice system to deal with the bad people who use everyday items.
It is a problem created by entirely by Apple and technology companies.

A car’s purpose is to travel one location to another.

A tracker’s purpose is to share the GPS location of something in real-time.

A trillion dollar company has a responsibility to understand and study the implications of a technology before a massive release.

For the last 20 years, technology companies have had too much freedom to experiment on people and societies.

Imagine if a drug company just released drugs without any rigorous studies and trials?

We have safeguards for those to have approvals, we need to evolve our way of thinking to expand that for technology in terms of privacy and security.

Example: most of the general public doesn’t actually understand just how bad it is with privacy and the ways companies are bypassing existing privacy laws by using things like data clean rooms to exchange behavioral data with each other. Google about how clean rooms are used in MarTech.
 
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But only if the owner of the other AirTag isn't with you anymore but his AirTag is?
Sadly, no. Whenever my wife and I go out of town, she gets alerts that my AirPods Pro are following her. We also visited a relative out of town and the second day we were at their house me and my wife were both getting alerts that their AirPods Max had been following us.
 
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