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I just can't stand that Apple won't allow me to share AirTags with family. If I was a single guy with a car, sure... an AirTag works, but when I share cars with my wife and even teenagers the AirTag becomes a problem putting out alerts and beeping if the AirTag's owner isn't the one in the car. I get that Apple is worried about domestic violence or stalking issues, even among family members, but if all the family OPTS into a tag that's on us... yet they won't offer the option.
 
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I had my car stolen 10 days ago in the UK. The Porsche Factory fitted tracker was ripped out, but the AirTag saved the day, the police went to the position I gave them in East London, and recovered my car.
 
The AirTag's effectiveness could be limited if Apple notifies the thief's phone that there is an AirTag following them. However, if the AirTag is hidden well, it could buy the owner and the authorities enough time to find the stolen item, or persuade the thief to abandon the theft.
 
You can even hide 2 AirTags in the vehicle. One very easy to find and another real hard. This will certainly make the thiefs abandon it
 
I just can't stand that Apple won't allow me to share AirTags with family. If was a single guy with a car, sure... an AirTag works, but when I share cars with my wife and even teenagers the AirTag becomes a problem putting out alerts and beeping if the AirTag's owner isn't the one in the car. I get that Apple is worried about domestic violence or stalking issues, even among family members, but if all the family OPTS into a tag that's on us... yet they won't offer the option.
Don't worry, AirTag sharing is coming! Apple will release this feature in 5 years and claim it as a world-first, life changing innovation that took years of R&D from a design team of thousands of visionaries and have a glamorous movie to show you at the keynote and on apple.com. Available only on the new iPhone, pre-orders open in a week, starting at $3,200!
 
The question discussed was that cars act as Faraday cages to some extent, so depending on where you place the AirTag within the car, the NFC may become more limited. I was pointing out that testing this would require driving the car without an Apple mobile device inside.
That's why it is not relying on NFC to be detected.

My experience is that my car get located quite often during the day, when people are walking by.
 
I am not sure you know how electronic, state-sponsored/state-actor surveillance works.

IC-level, PHY-level, or just even basic "well, we know the BLE identifiers for these devices we gave out and we literally have comms devices on every intersection and block that can sense the address in real time" is par for the course.

Snowden's leaks were 10 years ago and highlighted these, and 10 years is an eternity...you have no idea how pervasive and invasive these systems are if you don't think AirTags, etc are exploited left and right outside the Apple ecosystem/control. Apple's encryption is not going to help here, at all.

They may "just" be a police department, but I guarantee you the NYPD has the resources to do this very, very easily. And they've certainly shown the willingness/gall/disrespect for civil liberties, too. Not a good combo.
I don’t doubt the NYPD is corrupt and what not, but there ain’t a whole they can do with an AirTag. Now, if you go to get one, and it’s already been removed from its packaging, the I’d be concerned, but otherwise you’re just spreading a bunch if FUD.
 
That's why it is not relying on NFC to be detected.
Right, it’s actually BLE, but that doesn’t change the point. I’m sure there are places in car where the signal gets attenuated more than in other places, so how reliably it is located will probably depend to some extent on where you place it.
 
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Where are good places to put the AirTag? I wonder about all the metal blocking the signal.

I guess I could try different locations and see how strong the signal is if that is possible or easy
 
Where are good places to put the AirTag? I wonder about all the metal blocking the signal.

I guess I could try different locations and see how strong the signal is if that is possible or easy

As a first guess, I would say that if you have good cell phone reception at one place, you probably have a good emission with the airTag. In contrary, if you have no reception in a location, nobody will detect an airTag there.
 
The AirTag's effectiveness could be limited if Apple notifies the thief's phone that there is an AirTag following them. However, if the AirTag is hidden well, it could buy the owner and the authorities enough time to find the stolen item, or persuade the thief to abandon the theft.

No, telling the thief that they’re being tracked is the entire point. That’s the deterrent. Put it in a part of the car that they won’t easily take out. The steering wheel would be my go to, or deep inside the driver’s seat padding. Make it even harder for them to pinpoint by taking out the AirTag’s speaker.

No thief is going to spend more than 20-30 minutes trying to find and remove an AirTag while knowing that they’re most likely already being tracked and the cops or owner is minutes away. They’ll ditch the car where they were notified and then you can go collect the car with the thief long gone.

That said, there are still a lot of dumb thieves, and those will be caught red handed, most likely bringing the car to their own hiding spot/home/garage.

Again more loudly for the people in the back: telling the thief that they’re being tracked is the deterrent.
 
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pretty much, but saying that we need to be tough on crime is some how a radical position now.
It's the optics of who is going to be in jail if they actually put criminals in jail.
They’re more concerned with the optics
What they're encouraging here would literally make it easier to put people in jail
They will be out in a few hours with no bail and their sentence will be 3 hours community service. It's a joke I lived there, they only put super violent criminals in jail these days.
 
We need, "This Car is Equipped with Apple AirTag" stickers from Apple or NYC Police Department.
This is what we need.

1683065034324.png
 
Apple should disable the “you are being tracked by an Airtag” feature. It would make Airtags far more useful in cars to prevent theft and keeping an airtag in your kid's backpack to track the kids whereabouts.
 
Do you really think th police look for stolen cars? hat take a report, but that is it.
They may not go out personally looking. However, where I live, some cruisers have tag readers that will alert to a car reported stolen. Also, some places have stationary cameras that will alert when a stolen car has passed (as they voluntarily share info with the PD), allowing police to investigate/traffic stop. In conjuction with the AirTags, one might have an easier time finding the vehicle and making an arrest (for instance if it goes into a parking garage, or avoids the traffic stop somehow).

Screen Shot 2023-05-02 at 21.02.04 PM.png


 
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They will be out in a few hours with no bail and their sentence will be 3 hours community service. It's a joke I lived there, they only put super violent criminals in jail these days.
I live in New York and I think you're mistaken. There's no cash bail for misdemeanors, or petty theft (under $1000). If you steal a car, you will be held on bail. More specifically, it's considered grand larceny, which has cash bail
 
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Apple should disable the “you are being tracked by an Airtag” feature. It would make Airtags far more useful in cars to prevent theft and keeping an airtag in your kid's backpack to track the kids whereabouts.

Sadly the stalkers ruined it for everyone.
 
No, telling the thief that they’re being tracked is the entire point. That’s the deterrent. Put it in a part of the car that they won’t easily take out. The steering wheel would be my go to, or deep inside the driver’s seat padding. Make it even harder for them to pinpoint by taking out the AirTag’s speaker.

No thief is going to spend more than 20-30 minutes trying to find and remove an AirTag while knowing that they’re most likely already being tracked and the cops or owner is minutes away. They’ll ditch the car where they were notified and then you can go collect the car with the thief long gone.

That said, there are still a lot of dumb thieves, and those will be caught red handed, most likely bringing the car to their own hiding spot/home/garage.

Again more loudly for the people in the back: telling the thief that they’re being tracked is the deterrent.

Good points.
 
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