David Manning is a tech youtuber who does a bit of everything: he tests cameras, makes tutorials, vlogs, etc. In one of his latest videos, he explained what one of the biggest problems with AirTags is, and he gave us quite an effective solutionalthough controversial.
Airtags are those little tracking devices that Apple introduced a few years ago. They are used to put them on everything you want to be able to find easily: keys, a backpack, a suitcase… whatever. However, there are those who intend to use them not so much in case something is lost, but if it is stolen, and this is where the AirTags do not end up convincing.
A very dangerous double-edged sword
To be fair to Apple, nowhere in the AirTag ads, presentation, or anywhere does it say they are effective in tracking down whoever stole something from you. In fact, they are not. It makes sense though.
Some time ago controversy erupted that some (thankfully few) users were using AirTags to locate other people without them noticing. They put them in their bags, in their cars or wherever, and they permanently located them on the map. At Apple, ardent defender of privacyhe was horrified by this situation, and that’s why they added a function to the AirTag to avoid this kind of thing as much as possible.
If after a while your iPhone detects that you are being tracked by an AirTag, it will notify you and It will allow you to ring it to be able to locate it. In fact, Apple and Google recently announced a collaboration to make it work whether you have an iPhone or Android. Worked well there.
A very interesting dilemma arises between security and privacy, and Apple has resolved it in favor of the latter.
The thing is, if the person with our AirTag is a thief, all it takes is for your iPhone to detect our AirTag, and it rings, finds it, launches it, and we miss our business. However, there is a solution to this, even if it is very dangerous, and it will obviously expire your warranty.
This youtuber opened the AirTag and ripped off the built-in speaker. This way it won’t ring when the thief looks for it, and we will have more opportunities to recover what is ours. Of course, the same could be done by those who want to locate us without our consent.
The YouTuber explains that in cases of harassment, we have already seen that there have been individuals who they actually removed the speaker from their AirTags. In these cases, what to do when our iPhone detects an AirTag that is not ours, but does not ring, would be to call the police, since they will find it more easily.
Once they do, they just need to check with Apple which Apple ID is linked to that AirTag, and they will be able to find out who was trying to locate you. On the other hand, it is clear that a thief is not going to call the authorities to tell them that he stole something, that he has an AirTag and that they can find it, so in that sense we are more protected.
Anyway, we from Applesfera, we do not recommend making this change. Your AirTag would lose its warranty, you could have another legal issue, and we don’t think it’s that necessary either. Of course, the final decision is yours, and if you’re doing it for a good purpose, that’s not too bad either.
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