[HN Gopher] A 10-Year Battery for AirTag
___________________________________________________________________
A 10-Year Battery for AirTag
Author : dmd
Score : 660 points
Date : 2024-12-18 18:17 UTC (2 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.elevationlab.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.elevationlab.com)
| janandonly wrote:
| That is not how batteries work. Batteries drain even under
| minimal usage.
|
| My bet is that in 2/3 years this device will stop working
| already.
|
| Just change the batteries if you AirTag once a year. Especially
| if you are using an AirTag to keep watch over 10.000 dollar
| equipment.
| Kirby64 wrote:
| Lithium batteries (like the 1.5V energizer suggested) have
| extremely low self discharge. The reason why lithium batteries
| are used for long life is because you can actually reliably
| count on them to not self discharge after 20 years. As long as
| the mAh is 10x the coin cells they use, I'd totally believe the
| 10 year statement.
| alnwlsn wrote:
| Here [0] is the datasheet for the batteries used. 25 year shelf
| life is spec'd.
|
| I have personally run these cells buried underground, and
| gotten 4.5 years out of 4 of them, though my application is
| just for fun and likely not as power conservative as an AirTag.
|
| [0] https://data.energizer.com/pdfs/l91.pdf
| michaelmior wrote:
| Okay, now I'm really curious what application you have for a
| device buried underground.
| 01HNNWZ0MV43FF wrote:
| Ooh what's the application underground?
| alnwlsn wrote:
| So I attend this local annual event that has a time
| capsule. Each year, we bury one and dig up the one from 5
| years ago. This has gone on for several decades, and people
| are always thinking of interesting things to put in there.
|
| I made a little electronics project that is somewhere
| between "what happens inside a time capsule while it's
| buried?" and "what if you could wind a watch once and have
| it still be ticking in 5 years?"
|
| I nearly forgot that I made a project page for it:
| https://hackaday.io/project/160740-low-power-environment-
| mon...
|
| I dug up the first one last year and it had made it to 4.5
| years, and I'm actually due to dig up the second one next
| week.
| m463 wrote:
| Lots of smoke alarms now have 10 year batteries.
| jerlam wrote:
| Now mandated in California.
|
| No more waking up in the middle of the night and crawling up
| a ladder to find out which of your smoke alarms decided it
| was too cold and decided to sing its low battery chirp.
| michaelmior wrote:
| Also in New York. Personally I'm all for this even though I
| think it does make detectors a bit more expensive. Not only
| because it avoids the need to change batteries, but because
| it's more likely that smoke detectors actually get replaced
| at their end of life.
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| Does that fix it or make it worse? If you have 10 smoke
| detectors and they end up randomly staggered so this
| happens once a year, and you can't replace the batteries
| anymore... that seems worse than the old system which
| completely eliminated this issue if you just replaced them
| all every year or two on a schedule.
| jo909 wrote:
| Remember that you are supposed to replace the entire
| thing because the other components like the sensor or
| simply capacitors also age. It is a very cheap safety
| device and simply not worth taking any risks by
| stretching it to say 15 years instead. The proper way
| would be to replace them while they were all still fine
| by making a note in the calendar.
|
| There are two cases:
|
| Your products are faulty and at least one has not made
| their intended 10 year lifespan. I'd change them all for
| better ones.
|
| Or
|
| They have reached their lifespan and you only noticed
| because the first one failed. I'd replace them all.
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| Fair point, although with a 400+ year half life in the
| americium source in the detector, I am skeptical that a
| new smoke detector would be any more reliable than a very
| old one.
|
| I would think testing them regularly - especially with
| simulated smoke as done in professional situations, or in
| my case via bad cooking, is probably more effective than
| regular replacement on a schedule to ensure they are
| always working.
|
| If dealing with something that follows a Poisson failure
| probability distribution with a fixed percentage
| probability of failure per year (as is the case with most
| electrical components), regular replacement only makes
| the system more reliable if you are unable to test it,
| otherwise it makes no difference.
|
| With a few rare exceptions, is largely a myth that
| replacing machines or technology at regular intervals
| increases reliability- people incorrectly assume this to
| be true, based on observing that most failures happen to
| things that are old, but this is merely because they
| spend more time being old, not because the rate of
| failure per time increases with age (it almost never
| does). Testing and redundancy are more effective and
| cheaper.
|
| Now, everything I am saying would be wrong if smoke
| detectors indeed have components besides the alpha source
| whose failure rates are known to increase with age, and
| actually age out within a decade or so. Like you
| mentioned, this can be the case with electrolytic
| capacitors as well as non solid state relays. However, I
| wouldn't be surprised if the lifespan of capacitors at
| the low temp and low voltages in a smoke detector wasn't
| 50+ years.
| taylodl wrote:
| This solution makes the AirTag bigger. Might be okay for a photo
| bag, it's quite cumbersome for car keys and dogs. Besides, your
| phone will warn you when the battery is getting low. I always
| keep a couple of 2032 batteries on hand and soon as I get the low
| battery warning I just pop a new one in.
| moojacob wrote:
| They talked about this in the article. It is for bigger items
| like RVs and camera bags that you also don't interact a lot on
| a daily basis.
| grouchomarx wrote:
| >Might be okay for a photo bag
|
| Yes that's what its for
| jerlam wrote:
| Not a bad price, but it does require an existing Airtag.
|
| Ten years is a very long time in tech. I wouldn't be confident
| that the Airtag protocol will be functioning in 2035, and there
| are already rumors of a new Airtag and possibly a newer protocol
| coming up.
| spiderfarmer wrote:
| If Apple kills existing Airtags any time soon they effectively
| kill the product line. So they won't.
| minton wrote:
| This might underestimate Apple consumerism (I include myself
| in that).
| tpetry wrote:
| Its really easy for them, and this also in line how they
| would operate:
|
| Add a new Airtag v2 protocol to the next iPhone and sell new
| Airtags only using that protocol. Why should you buy them?
| They could have different improvements you would like.
|
| Start deprecating Airtag v1 in 3-4 years - and only sell new
| ones. There are now 3-4 iPhone generations that can handle
| the new version.
|
| The next iPhone in 6-7 years doesn't support Airtags v1
| anymore as it is obsolete now for many years.
|
| Voila, they killed Airtags v1 in less than 10 years without
| killing the entire product line by switching to a new
| version. Is that unrealistic? No, thats their normal way how
| they deprecate stuff. It still works but only with old
| hardware or by not getting new updates anymore (iOS, macOS).
| BudaDude wrote:
| I would agree with you if this was a main line product
| (iPad, Macs, iPhone). You could argue the Apple Watch is a
| main line product as well.
|
| But this is an accessory line. Apple is pretty good at
| keeping accessories working for as long as possible.
| AirPods v1 still work. A Magic Mouse bought 10 years ago
| still works as long as the battery isn't dead.
| withinboredom wrote:
| actually ... it doesn't. Well, you can't use them with a
| phone anymore because they did exactly as described. The
| new mice work fine though.
| samatman wrote:
| This is not at all in line with how Apple operates, it's
| diametrically opposed to it in fact.
|
| I suppose you could contradict me by providing a list of
| the products Apple has deprecated this way.
|
| Can you?
| hatsix wrote:
| It's exactly how Apple operates. The last Apple device
| with Firewire was produced in 2012, though it was sold
| for several more years. MacOS 13 (2022) dropped the
| Firewire CoreAudio driver (as well as other, more niche
| support for Firewire). So... exactly 10 years.
|
| If you're going to put me in a bucket, I'd be in the
| "Apple Hater" bucket, but I honestly think that the way
| that they do this is fine. It would have been better if
| they had jumped on the USB bandwagon earlier, they
| certainly love to build their own solutions that are
| incompatible with where the rest of the industry (see
| also, their proprietary wireless audio, their proprietary
| bluetooth codec, their proprietary thunderbolt
| extensions, their proprietary magsafe power connectors,
| their proprietary Lightning cable/connector, their
| forking of webkit off of khtml, their changes to webkit
| that are part of Safari but haven't been pushed upstream
| to webkit)
|
| Anyways, this is exactly their MO and it's not bad. Apple
| doesn't need you to contradict everything people say
| about Apple.
| samatman wrote:
| Apple sold the first widely-available computer with USB
| connections, the iMac G3.
|
| > _To replace the removed ports, the iMac has Universal
| Serial Bus (USB) ports, which were faster and cheaper
| than Apple Desktop Bus and serial ports but were very new
| --the standard was not finalized until after the iMac 's
| release--and unsupported by any third-party Mac
| peripheral._ -
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IMac_G3#Design
|
| It would not be possible for them to jump on a bandwagon
| they started any earlier than they did.
|
| > _The last Apple device with Firewire was produced in
| 2012_
|
| Thunderbolt supports the Firewire protocol in the
| transport layer. So this means that people who need to
| support a Firewire device need a dongle now. Apple used
| to sell the adapter, apparently it's been discontinued,
| but they're still manufactured by third parties, and the
| originals available on the secondhand market. Which,
| given that Firewire is dead and buried, and no one is
| making new Firewire stuff, is also where you'd need to go
| to get something expecting Firewire to begin with.
|
| I do not see this as the problem you seem to.
| duskwuff wrote:
| > Apple sold the first widely-available computer with USB
| connections, the iMac G3.
|
| They were also, simultaneously, the first manufacturer to
| really go all-in on USB. Some PC manufacturers at the
| time were including one or two USB ports on their
| systems, but relied on legacy ports (PS/2, serial,
| parallel, etc) for most functionality. Their USB ports
| were mostly a show of "look, we have the new thing" -
| much in the same way that modern PC motherboards may have
| a single USB-C port on the back, actually.
| myself248 wrote:
| I interpreted it precisely the opposite. PC mobos were
| like "Look, you can use the new things if you have any,
| but we're not gonna make you throw out your PS/2
| peripherals that you know and love, or even buy adapters
| for them, because all that stuff, and the support
| circuitry for it on the mobo, all works just fine."
|
| The all-in approach required a forklift upgrade and
| generated a ton of e-waste.
| duskwuff wrote:
| > The all-in approach required a forklift upgrade and
| generated a ton of e-waste.
|
| It really wasn't that bad. I lived through it.
|
| The iMac was pitched as an entry-level Internet computer
| for new computer users. Many buyers didn't have a
| computer at all previous to purchasing an iMac, or only
| had one which was old enough that its accessories would
| have been irrelevant (e.g. an external modem). Probably
| the most common USB accessory purchase was external
| floppy drives - and a lot of users ended up discarding
| those after they realized they weren't using them.
| hatsix wrote:
| Maybe you missed the part where I said "this is fine". I
| don't have a problem with what they're doing, I have a
| problem with people saying that Apple doesn't do
| something that they very clearly do.
|
| Also, I thought I was fairly clear in my comment, but
| Apple removed support in MacOS 13 for Firewire Audio...
| so it doesn't matter what kind of dongles you have, as
| soon as you update to 13, your firewire camera no longer
| works.
|
| It's weird that Apple is removing driver-level support
| for a protocol. It's unexpected. It's also a dead tech
| that nobody cares about. The person I was responding to
| wanted an example of accessories that Apple stopped
| supporting, and "Anything with Firewire Audio" falls into
| that category. It is completely, utterly unusable with
| stock MacOS 13, though it's likely that some people have
| found a way to put it back in.
| joshstrange wrote:
| I might be missing something but Apple was the first
| (major) company to ship USB 1.1 in 1998 on the iMac. It
| was a big deal IIRC also because they removed the floppy
| drive at the same time.
|
| But maybe you are talking about something else?
| jychang wrote:
| I don't know if you were around in ~2005 ish, but for the
| longest time Apple backed Firewire 400/800 over USB2.0,
| because it was faster. Apple supported USB, of course,
| but it was clear that Firewire was the connector of
| choice.
| mmahemoff wrote:
| You're right Apple has a playbook of changing port types
| every few years, but there are adaptors available. The
| devices themselves still work, just that Apple knows they
| can use this one trick to encourage some customers to
| upgrade.
|
| With wireless devices, protocol changes would brick the
| device, so they'd be less likely to do it so quickly. As
| far as I know, Apple haven't announced any plans to
| deprecate the original Airpods, which came out 8 years
| ago and use some custom protocols alongside vanilla
| Bluetooth.
|
| Maybe in the future they'll start deprecating parts of
| the protocol ("in order to save your phone's battery
| life" or something), but I don't believe they have so
| far.
| myself248 wrote:
| Apple is to charging ports as Sony is to mass storage
| media.
| hatsix wrote:
| Specific to my comment, Apple removed code that supports
| audio over Firewire. It doesn't matter if adapters are
| available, cameras and microphones that used Firewire no
| longer work on MacOS 13+.
|
| Again, it had a long run, I'm not upset that they "only"
| supported it for 10 years... but let's be very clear, the
| devices don't work. Also, this is them removing support
| for a protocol that is part of the base MacOS, so it's
| exactly like what will eventually happen when Apple stops
| supporting the original Airpods protocols.
|
| I don't think that's any time soon, and if you're in the
| Apple ecosystem, go ham... let's just be very clear about
| the comparisons here.
| MikeRichardson wrote:
| FireWire hard drives still work fine though. (FireWire
| 800 to Thunderbolt adapter, connected to a Thunderbolt to
| TB3 adapter).
|
| Why support the adapter and hard drives, but not audio
| devices?
|
| (What else used FireWire besides mass storage, audio
| stuff, the original iSight, and Time Warner Cable boxes
| from 2005?)
| tonygiorgio wrote:
| Doing a v2 isn't the same as "killing AirTags." V2 could
| even have the same exact size and it would still be useful,
| just swap out. Worst case, buy a v1 to v2 adapter if it's
| smaller, or hell, just buy another $20 10 year battery
| pack. If you're protecting $10k equipment, who cares about
| spending $20. Piece of mind and durability matters a lot.
| makeitdouble wrote:
| If the product line stops making sense or enough money
| they'll kill it. They're no Google, but it won't be the first
| product line that goes belly up.
|
| The best scenario would be an industry standard that is
| widely more interesting than AirTags and works around the
| current compromises, letting Apple expand support to a wider
| audience. E.g. if the stalking problem had an elegant
| solution.
| smileybarry wrote:
| AirTags use the same Find My protocol that's been out for years
| before them, I doubt Apple will cut them off. They also get
| regular software updates, so the hardware should last that.
| roger_ wrote:
| > I wouldn't be confident that the Airtag protocol will be
| functioning in 2035
|
| I'd agree if it were any company other than Apple. And if Apple
| goes under by 2035 then AirTags will be the least of our
| concern.
| chadash wrote:
| > Ten years is a very long time in tech.
|
| Well, they certainly _might_ be functioning in ten years from
| now. Conservatively, you get 5 years of use out of this, which
| isn't bad for $15-20, depending on your use case.
| jonhohle wrote:
| I replace AirTag batteries every 6 months to be safe, so $15
| (plus batteries) isn't significantly more expensive over 5
| years.
| csomar wrote:
| While Apple products become obsolete, they are not exactly
| _killed_. i.e. your 15 year old macbook still functions but is
| limited. The air tag is a bit different because deprecating the
| protocol essentially kills it completely.
|
| I highly doubt they do that unless they are remove airtags
| completely from their product line.
| ShakataGaNai wrote:
| They are coming up on 4 years old. I have quite a number of
| them and do have to replace batteries frequently enough that it
| can get annoying.
|
| I'm sure Apple will innovate and come up with something
| newer/better/etc at some point. But it's unlikely the gen1
| devices will go away anytime soon. Even if the real life is
| only... 5 years, that still saves a number of battery changes
| for devices that maybe you don't want to deal with regularly.
|
| And with the fact that Apple had enough demand to increase the
| limit from 16 to 32 per account (
| https://9to5mac.com/2024/01/12/airtag-limit/ ). Clearly people
| have bought into the ecosystem in a big way. 30 Airtags * $25
| each is $750. I don't think they'll decommission the gen1
| system anytime soon with that much investment. Plus Apple is
| surprisingly good at supporting their hardware for a reasonable
| amount of time. The iPhone XR from 2018 is still supported by
| iOS 18.
| jakedata wrote:
| Brilliant, I just ordered a couple. But I bet that case muffles
| the sound when the AirTag decides to sing you the song of its
| people. This might be a boon to AirTag stalkers who are too lazy
| or unskilled to disable the sound and upgrade the battery life.
| kylebenzle wrote:
| > This might be a boon to AirTag stalkers who are too lazy or
| unskilled to disable the sound and upgrade the battery life.
|
| What a nonsensical fear to have.
| jakedata wrote:
| Why is that nonsensical? Airtags are very nice little bits of
| technology, a marvel really. But examples of abuse are not
| theoretical. Increasing the battery life by years and placing
| the airtag in a waterproof case are totally valid things a
| legitimate user might wish to do, but it also enhances their
| nefarious or unethical use potential. That is not nonsense.
| fragmede wrote:
| that's not the part that seems nonsensical. it's the idea
| that a stalker wouldn't just pull out the speaker.
| wlesieutre wrote:
| Or for the comment's theoretical "too lazy or unskilled
| to disable the sound" stalker, wrap the airtag in a sock
| and stick it in a tupperware container.
|
| "Put the airtag in a box" is not really an exclusive
| invention here.
| Zababa wrote:
| Most criminals are dumb. Anything that makes their job
| easier can increase the crime rate/efficiency of their
| criminal activities. I'm pretty sure stalking with
| devices increased after the Airtag was released.
| hiatus wrote:
| Even android will notify you if you are walking around
| with an airtag in your pocket.
| 15155 wrote:
| I was hoping to see a betavoltaic battery here.
| LeafItAlone wrote:
| Really neat idea and at that price I'll probably get some for
| luggage and my backpacks, where I have AirTags that stay there
| the whole time.
|
| One thing I'm curious about battery leakage. Many of the
| batteries of my remotes and similar devices seem to leak after a
| while (including one I heard pop and got very warm). These are
| devices that do get frequent usage, so they aren't just sitting
| without any discharge (but also the drain for a remote would be
| very minimal).
|
| Would this device experience the same, given how little power the
| AirTag needs?
| ssl-3 wrote:
| This appears to be intended to be used with lithium primary
| cells.
|
| Lithium primary cells tend not to get all leaky with age like
| alkalines do. (They'll keep your remote working approximately
| forever, too.)
| sss111 wrote:
| Project Farm did a test for the best battery and lithium
| batteries smoked all the alkalines:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efDTP5SEdlo
| buescher wrote:
| IIRC the packaging pretty much says, should they leak,
| Energizer really wants to hear about it. For what that's
| worth.
| zeagle wrote:
| Does anyone know what camera bag that is on that website. Peak
| design? Looks perfect for my usual load out.
| m463 wrote:
| Looks like any number of generic camera bags.
|
| Camera bag design seems to have moved on from that, and a sling
| design seems to be more popular.
|
| The sling lets you swing the bag from your back under your arm
| to in front of you. There is a zipper towards the side that
| lets you securely access the camera and accessories.
|
| So pretty easily you can get your camera out, or later put it
| back without removing the backpack.
| zeagle wrote:
| That's fair. And thanks for the thoughtful reply! I was
| thinking more for travel / safe storage. I'm often flying on
| small planes and to throw it in my duffle.
|
| My solution is I have a PD 30L as with dslr, 200-400, macro,
| 24-74 lens two straps are nice to have purely due to weight
| vs sling. The side access is clutch.
| 542354234235 wrote:
| I'm pretty sure it is the DSLR Pro Pack by Incase.
|
| https://www.incase.com/products/dslr-pro-pack?srsltid=AfmBOo...
| neilv wrote:
| It's a good design, IME. Lowepro makes a variety of similar
| ones. (I had a one similar to the photo, fitting 2 bodies,
| wide L, long L, f/1.4 prime, strobes and triggers, and boxes
| of strobe batteries.)
|
| Lowepro also has day/overnight/carryon backpacks, so you can
| carry some DSLR gear, laptop, change of clothes, and
| toiletries, all in one bag.
|
| I still have one LowePro day backpack that I repurposed as
| engineer/startup briefcase. It fits a huge laptop and misc.
| stuff for working late hours, and has a DSLR door in the
| side, so you can slide one shoulder strap off off long enough
| swing it forward like a sling bag, for quick access to a good
| camera for serendipitous shots.
|
| Regarding real sling bags, I personally wouldn't use for
| lengthy carrying of heavy stuff, since it's asymmetric
| left/right. I even got rid of my grocery canvas tote bags,
| and use an old backpack for carrying home groceries.
| dcdc123 wrote:
| Cool idea for a product but you either have to be a serious
| airhead or just lazy to miss or ignore all the low battery
| notifications. Also, that case should have a spot to store the
| back plate.
|
| > Just discard the AirTag's back plate
| avree wrote:
| It's a cool hack, but a terrible idea for a product. There are
| more components than the battery that will fail over a 10 year
| period (both in hardware and in software) - which is why
| ignoring notifications, and assuming that this product solves
| your problem is a big issue.
| jrmg wrote:
| This seems incredibly pessimistic to me. Do you really not
| expect things to last for over ten years?
|
| In my experience most electronic things - and especially
| things that are simple and solid with no wear and tear like
| an AirTag - easily last 10 years. I'd expect an AirTag to
| work for, at least, decades.
| dmd wrote:
| My amplifier and speakers date from the 70s.
| avree wrote:
| Do they run a proprietary Apple software, and have NFC
| and UWB inside them?
| Spivak wrote:
| When the software is fixed we're back to thinking of the
| object as a single piece of hardware. My Gamecube and
| Xbox 360 have been working for (nearly) 20 years now.
|
| Unless there's a known failure mode in these devices that
| gets worn down over time you should probably expect them
| to outlive you. The worst you'll probably get is
| corrosion from the AA batteries in the pack.
| avree wrote:
| The software isn't fixed.
| zamadatix wrote:
| I've got a 10 year old Bluetooth headset that works fine with
| a 2024 iPhone so why would something even simpler so
| obviously not?
| pcdoodle wrote:
| This guy replaces his garage door opener every 2 years...
| mikestew wrote:
| Your smoke alarm has a ten year battery.
| jen729w wrote:
| But when you have 4 -- and I bet people have more -- it does
| get a bit boring having to switch them out. It's no longer an
| annual event, it's now quarterly.
|
| I mean, first-world problem. But if it could be less frequent,
| of course I'd take it.
| smileybarry wrote:
| I have about 8. They used to run low at the same-ish time
| frame, but over time they drift apart due to frequency of
| moving around. (e.g.: the AirTag in my luggage runs out
| months after the one in my wallet)
| LegitShady wrote:
| its not about missing the notifications, its about not needing
| to worry about it.
| 542354234235 wrote:
| But these don't exist in a vacuum. Replacing one battery a year
| is not a big deal. But I'm also replacing the 8-10 door sensor
| batteries yearly, 3 water leak sensors, etc. In a set it and
| forget it product that you may not use for weeks or months at a
| time, but also really need to work the one time you do need it,
| increasing the lifespan by an order of magnitude can have real
| value.
| brandon272 wrote:
| I have frequently had the batteries run out on mine and I can't
| recall ever getting a proactive notification about it. However,
| "airhead" would potentially be an accurate term to describe me
| when it comes to how I usually handle such notifications, so
| maybe that's the problem!
| saturn8601 wrote:
| Any chance that the AirTag could have a software memory leak that
| would normally be masked by cutting power once a year? Its
| possible right? The code must be written in something low level
| like C.
|
| Would be kinda funny if 10 years from now the author gets his
| stuff stolen again and then discovers said memory leak crashed
| the Airtag 9 years ago. As Elon Musk likes to say: "The most
| ironic outcome is the most likely" . (OP I hope your stuff does
| not get stolen again, its just a joke)
| smileybarry wrote:
| AirTags get updates regularly, so they'd probably get power-
| cycled sooner than that.
| kube-system wrote:
| They're not being updated any more frequently than they are
| already reporting their battery status, are they?
| unsnap_biceps wrote:
| I would presume the battery status is sent as part of the
| beacon, firmware is updated only when the phone is locked
| and charging in range of the tag.
| kube-system wrote:
| I believe that's correct. I get low battery notifications
| when I am out of range of mine, I think.
| buescher wrote:
| I would also imagine someone with a fleet of these would be
| pretty cheesed if Apple rolled out an update that drained some
| fair fraction of users' batteries, no matter how fast they
| fixed it.
| fiatpandas wrote:
| That's a very good point. The system design of the airtags
| assumed a much shorter battery life, which may have led to
| decisions that would introduce issues at 10x battery life.
| Thinking more like overflow issues. But could also be a
| complete non-issue. Hard to say.
| duskwuff wrote:
| Given the resources on the device (it's a Nordic nRF52832
| with 64 KB RAM), I'd expect any memory leaks or similar
| defects to show up well before a year.
| Karliss wrote:
| Reasonably designed embedded device like that should be using a
| watchdog timer which automatically restarts it if code gets
| stuck (it's a basic hardware level feature available in almost
| all microcontrollers), and any crash should also cause a
| reboot.
|
| Considering the nature of product there is no interactive
| interface, it doesn't perform any critical operation like motor
| or heater control which couldn't be easily interrupted and
| resumed a fraction of second later after the reboot. In case of
| memory leak or some kind of memory allocator error it would
| also be safe to reboot. User wouldn't even notice if this
| happened.
|
| So even if something goes wrong, chance of it being
| uncrecoverable seems low. It would need to be either some kind
| of persistent storage bug causing it to get stuck in a bootloop
| (in which case battery change wouldn't help either), or high
| level logic error preventing normal functioning while keeping
| the main loop running without crash or getting stuck (writing
| code in higher level programming language wouldn't prevent a
| logic error).
| randyrand wrote:
| double the battery & double the size would be the sweet spot for
| me.
|
| this is a bit big and heavy.
| Brajeshwar wrote:
| I'm OK with the One-Year-ish battery life and happy to change
| them yearly. I try to do them in batches (the fours usually die
| together within about a month).
|
| The irritating ones are in the bags/check-ins I stashed/stored
| snugly, and now I have to take them out to replace the battery.
| Of course, the bearable thing is that the battery lasts for about
| a month after the warning, so there is that.
|
| I think I'm complaining about something which is not a big deal.
|
| I'm not sure if this much bigger device is any benefit just to
| make it last 10-years and forget about it.
| MisterTea wrote:
| Well look at in in terms of batteries deposited per year in the
| landfill: 0.1 or 1.
| conductr wrote:
| GAAP requires you to accrue your batteries deposited in
| landfill, so back to 0.1 per year (/s if not obvious)
| ianferrel wrote:
| Two AA batteries is about 16 cm^3 of waste. 10 CR2032s is
| about 10 cm^3.
|
| "Number of batteries" is not the right thing to measure.
| Maybe volume isn't either, but it's got to be closer.
| duxup wrote:
| At 10 years I kinda wonder what the odds your AA batteries become
| problem occasionally (leaking, etc) long before the Airtag...
| although they are Lithium batteries.
| riffic wrote:
| are lithium batteries known to expand or catch fire in the AA
| form factor?
| kube-system wrote:
| I believe that is primarily an issue for damaged or
| rechargeable lithium batteries, so not really a concern here.
| homebrewer wrote:
| I think you misunderstood GP. Lithium AA batteries are very
| reliable and keep charge for at least ten years (the standard
| metric is losing approximately 1% per year), that's what he's
| saying.
|
| They won't burn because they contain metallic lithium (and
| not lithium salts like rechargeable cells) and _don 't_
| contain easily flammable organic solvents (yep, like
| rechargeable cells). There are videos on YouTube of people
| disassembling them with no problems (for example, to extract
| metallic lithium for chemistry experiments).
| riffic wrote:
| it's a sincere and earnest question - I didn't know. I
| appreciate the additional info.
| IshKebab wrote:
| I think leaking is relatively rare, but based on my experience
| of "10 year" smoke detector batteries they usually don't last
| anywhere near that.
|
| Also there's stupid legislation in the UK at least around
| making smoke detectors with replaceable batteries. Took me
| quite a while to find some.
| roger_ wrote:
| This solves one of my biggest issues with AirTags and I'd be
| tempted to buy one if AirTag 2s weren't right around the
| corner...
| SSchick wrote:
| Pretty much this, I hope they retain the form factor, I would
| very much buy 3-4 of these for my luggage, I previously duct-
| taped airtags inside of the case but they died within a year,
| this would help a lot.
| renewiltord wrote:
| Replacing batteries is a pretty big annoyance for me. But if I'm
| honest, the $19.99+Li Cell Cost is too steep for me. I'll just
| replace these every year.
| drdaeman wrote:
| Are AirTags actually useful for anti-theft purposes?
|
| I threw one in the trunk of my car (just in case - I ordered a
| 4-pack and I had a spare one), and every single time I drive
| somewhere it chirps loudly when I'm exiting my driveway, making
| its presence immediately obvious without any delays, and despite
| my phone being with me in the car.
| OutOfHere wrote:
| Samsung tracker doesn't have this silly problem.
| lcfcjs6 wrote:
| Samsung make trackers? Are you referring to tile?
| OutOfHere wrote:
| > Samsung make trackers?
|
| Yes.
|
| > Are you referring to tile?
|
| No.
| selcuka wrote:
| Samsung Galaxy SmartTags:
|
| https://www.samsung.com/us/support/answer/ANS00088244/
| KomoD wrote:
| Why would he be referring to Tile when he said Samsung?
| Samsung has nothing to do with Tile.
| carlgreene wrote:
| Yes, but only if you remove the speaker which is well
| documented on YouTube
| kube-system wrote:
| Even if you do that they will still notify a thief with a
| notification on their iPhone.
| omgwtfbyobbq wrote:
| I think that's ok though, right?
|
| As long as you do a good job placing/hiding it, the thief
| can't easily find and remove/disable without the speaker.
| kube-system wrote:
| How big is your item and how hard is it to search? If you
| know a bag has an airtag in it, it won't take that long
| to find.
| wholinator2 wrote:
| True, a suitcase could be quickly dispatched but you
| could hide it very very well on something like a car.
| kube-system wrote:
| Maybe, but is any old car thief on the street going to
| hang on to a car they know has an airtag in it? They
| probably were going to joy ride it for the afternoon,
| maybe commit some other crime, wreck it, and dump it
| regardless.
|
| I have an airtag in my car, but I don't think I'm going
| to get much value out of it other than finding my car
| when I forget where I'm parked.
|
| If you want to catch a criminal in the act, you usually
| need to observe surreptitiously or they'll change
| behavior.
| RandallBrown wrote:
| > but is any old car thief on the street going to hang on
| to a car they know has an airtag in it?
|
| No, and that's mostly the point right? If they get in the
| car, get an alert they're being tracked, then dump the
| car, at least you find it faster.
| kube-system wrote:
| By the point it's stolen, it's probably already too
| little too late. Not only will it probably be going to
| some impound lot before I can get to it -- it'll probably
| be on track to be my insurance company's car at that
| point. Seeing it on a map might be fun for curiosity's
| sake at that point, I guess.
| nucleardog wrote:
| If you get a bit creative you can definitely hide it well
| enough that "removing the air tag" is no longer the weak
| point in the plan.
|
| I've got a Pelican 1510 that has a suitcase-style pop up
| handle and wheels on it. It's just screwed on there. I
| took the screws out, took it off, filed the sides of the
| air tag down slightly so I could fit it in a little
| cranny and then held it in place with some black tape so
| it's hard to see. Even if you use an iPhone to try and
| find it, it looks like it's hidden in the liner or
| something. But it takes tools and about 15 minutes to get
| it out _even if you know exactly where it is_ and how to
| get to it.
|
| For one of my backpacks it actually came with an "air tag
| pocket" which is just a spot on an inside seam where
| there's a small gap you can slide the air tag in and it's
| held securely. I know it's there and it still takes me a
| while to find the thing to take it out.
|
| For my other, I pretty much just get by on it having a
| bazillion little pockets and pouches and lot of random
| stuff in it. The air tag's nestled in there beside the
| flashlight that the TSA spent almost a half hour looking
| for after x-raying my bag repeatedly before finally
| telling me what they were looking for and me pulling it
| out for them.
|
| I'm relatively certain I'd recover my bag with the air
| tag still in it. Whether or not the _valuables_ are still
| there is a different story.
| kube-system wrote:
| I have a feeling that thieves aren't going to spend any
| time fooling around if it isn't obvious, they'll dump the
| valuables out of the bag, and discard the bag.
| nucleardog wrote:
| Yeah that's kind of what I was alluding to in the last
| line. Was mostly responding to the idea that "it won't
| take that long to find".
|
| With a bit of creativity they can be made pretty hard to
| find. At least hard enough that they're no longer the
| weak link at all.
|
| The next step would be trying to make it more integral to
| whatever thing you're trying to track. If you disassemble
| an air tag and hide it inside your laptop, no thief is
| gonna pull out some precision screwdrivers and start
| trying to figure out where the hell it is. They're just
| going to get rid of it.
|
| ... Which I've thought about, but that's a level I don't
| think is really necessary for my own situation.
| robocat wrote:
| Presumably quite often the bag and the airtag are worth
| more than the contents?!
| nucleardog wrote:
| In my case definitely not.
|
| If I had nothing of value or only antifragile things I'd
| just throw everything in an old backpack. The reason I
| own the pelican case is for when I'm flying with $15k of
| computers, camera gear, etc. If anything I'd see the
| pelican case as _increasing_ my risk of it being stolen
| (who puts some clothes and some deodourant and a
| toothbrush in a $500 hard case?), but massively
| decreasing my risk of physical damage which is way more
| likely.
|
| The air tag isn't even really in there for "sophisticated
| thieves stole my stuff" purposes so much as "airline made
| me gate check it and now they've lost it" purposes.
| Though I imagine the air tag and some basic padlocks
| would definitely help my chances with most
| unsophisticated thieves.
| omgwtfbyobbq wrote:
| It's a vehicle and fairly hard to search.
| echoangle wrote:
| Only if a thief has an iPhone or manually installed the
| Android App.
| Grazester wrote:
| The latest version of Android shows this now. I had to
| install nothing on my phone for this(I get a full map
| showing the tracking behavior)
|
| From a year ago https://www.cnet.com/tech/mobile/newest-
| android-feature-aler...
| echoangle wrote:
| Ah I completely missed that, thanks! Very nice that this
| is supported everywhere now.
| IncreasePosts wrote:
| I wonder with customizations like in OP you could bypass
| this. For example, if the alert comes after 20 minutes of
| being near an air tag - if the power to the circuit was
| automatically cut for 1 minute every 15 minutes, would the
| alert still activate?
| kube-system wrote:
| I don't think it works like that, anyway. The alert is
| not generated by the airtag, it is generated by the
| phone. And the phone knows what is around it because it
| scans for beacons on a periodic basis.
| IncreasePosts wrote:
| Right - the phone itself is what is keeping track of the
| air tag, but if the phone doesn't detect the airtag for
| some period of time, I assume the anti-stalking timer
| resets. This is why if you walk past an airtag on the way
| to the store, and then walk by it again 20 minutes later,
| you won't get an anti-stalking alert.
| woobar wrote:
| But it doesn't do this right away.I was traveling with a
| group of people that had AirTags, and I only start getting
| alerts by day three.
| pnw wrote:
| I get them within 30 to 45 minutes, consistently. You
| won't get them if the people are traveling with you.
| kube-system wrote:
| You shouldn't get them _ever_ if you are traveling with
| the owner of the AirTag. The criteria for notification
| is:
|
| 1. the airtag is following you
|
| 2. the owner of the airtag does is not near the airtag
| dmajor2 wrote:
| No, they have been rendered useless for that purpose through
| software updates because of the almost 100% overlap of the use
| cases of 1) stalking someone 2) and tracking a thief.
| ronsor wrote:
| Wait until they realize the almost 100% overlap between the
| camera's use cases of 1) spying on people and 2) recording
| nature
| post-it wrote:
| Nature cameras are relatively hard to conceal (from
| humans), whereas AirTags are very easy to conceal.
| theshrike79 wrote:
| They are also very bad for tracking compared to what you
| can get on Aliexpress/eBay/Amazon (which are the same
| tbh).
|
| For about the same price you can get a device with a SIM
| card and GPS/GLONASS and _zero_ ways to detect it.
| post-it wrote:
| What's the battery life on that though? The appeal of
| AirTags is that they last a year and work anywhere that
| has an iPhone nearby.
| theshrike79 wrote:
| Depends on the device. Some are active all the time, some
| can sleep and only wake up to get their position fix
| every hour or so. It's not exactly rocket science to
| adjust the programming.
|
| And if you're stalking someone for a year, you'll have
| ample options to swap the device to a new one with a
| fresh battery.
| throwaway2037 wrote:
| Can you give a couple of example products? I am very
| curious.
| nucleardog wrote:
| I think you can still thread the needle. The cases are
| identical except for one situation--if the air tag is
| difficult to find or remove.
|
| If you can't find or remove the air tag, then the option you
| have left to not be tracked is to separate yourself from the
| tracked thing. In the case of someone being stalked, that's
| inconvenient (that doesn't do it justice, but not really
| important to my point). In the case of someone who stole
| something, that's actually the desired outcome.
|
| Imagine a situation where you get in a car and a few minutes
| later it says there's an air tag following you.
|
| If you're being stalked... you can drive straight to a
| mechanic who can take all the time they need to find it, take
| a taxi over to the police and report it, etc.
|
| If you just stole that car, now you know you're on the clock.
| Once someone's looking for you and that vehicle, there's a
| really good chance they're going to find it. You can take it
| to a mechanic, but a reputable mechanic might have some
| questions. You can try a less reputable mechanic, but they're
| gonna be pissed when the cops come knocking asking about the
| stolen car sitting over there and you might not be going back
| there any time soon. So if you can't find and remove the air
| tag relatively quickly, what options do you have left?
| Probably makes more sense to abandon the vehicle and try
| another one with a lower risk of winding up in jail.
|
| I _know_ where the air tag is in my suitcase and it would
| take me tools and ~15 minutes to remove. How long is someone
| going to spend at that versus just tossing it?
| to11mtm wrote:
| TBH your response makes me realize there's possibly a
| decent use case for bicycles with the right diameter
| tubing.
|
| > You can try a less reputable mechanic, but they're gonna
| be pissed when the cops come knocking asking about the
| stolen car sitting over there and you might not be going
| back there any time soon. So if you can't find and remove
| the air tag relatively quickly, what options do you have
| left? Probably makes more sense to abandon the vehicle and
| try another one with a lower risk of winding up in jail.
|
| Depends on the skill of the chop-shop or it's folks and
| where you are.
|
| A fun thought experience would be how much suspicion a
| flatbed tow truck with some form of faraday cage around the
| car, below a cover would get from LE.
|
| Agree with your general 'deterrent' concept, I think the
| main challenge a lot of folks run into is getting lazy with
| placement. Glove/console boxes, the 'pockets' on the back
| of front seats, are all stupid easy. Technically anything
| in the interior, probably can be 'found' with sufficient
| detection capability.
|
| No, you put that thing somewhere _weird_ and ideally a PITA
| to get at.
|
| This honestly gives me the idea of finding the right spot
| in my WRX front headlights to make it not visible; If the
| spot I'm thinking of will work, they'd literally have to
| pull off the front bumper to even get at it...
| anamexis wrote:
| There's a bunch of bicycle accessories available
| specifically for hiding Airtags on bicycles. Under the
| bottle cage and under the saddle are two popular options.
| nucleardog wrote:
| Not sure what year your WRX is but my my suggestion would
| be "cup holders". And I don't mean "leave it in a cup
| holder"--pop the boot off the hand brake and there's like
| one screw and some clips to remove the cup holders from
| the center console and then an absolute _ton_ of space
| underneath. Even if someone _was_ looking there, there's
| room to hide it (hell, it's carpeted so a discreet hole
| in the carpet could hide it well).
|
| If you put it towards the back near the center console
| storage, even with a phone someone's going to be checking
| the cup holders, the center console storage, down beside
| the seats, the seat back pockets, under the seats, _in
| the seats_, etc first. Then rechecking them. Then
| checking them again. Like you say, those would all be
| "normal" places to put it or drop it.
|
| But you'll be able to pull it out and replace the battery
| or something in like 20 minutes when you had to do it
| once a year with nothing but a phillips screwdriver.
|
| Alternatively, if you don't mind listening to it rattle
| around sometimes, from what I hear from people who have
| dropped rings and things into the under seat vents... you
| basically need to remove the entire interior to get in
| there. I'd get the 10 year battery first though.
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| There is something wrong with your configuration/setup, it is
| not supposed to start chirping unless it is out of range of
| your phone for at least 8 days, and not in one of the
| predefined geofence regions you can setup where it won't chirp.
|
| I have them on tons of my devices, including my kids personal
| items that go to school, etc. and they never chirp, and I can
| and have found items that were misplaced in public locations
| (but not actually stolen).
| drdaeman wrote:
| > There is something wrong with your configuration/setup
|
| Something is off for sure, but it's not like there are any
| user-configurable parts here. I literally just threw it in
| the trunk - and it's not like there's a right and a wrong way
| to do it. :-)
|
| I guess it's because I don't have a garage and my car is
| parked in a carport, about ~100 feet/~30 meters away from my
| apartment, so it "normally" doesn't sense my phone "nearby".
| Then, I suspect, when I walk down and sit in the car (which
| takes just a minute or two) there is not enough time for it
| to reconnect with the phone and realize the owner is around.
| Because an AirTag on my wallet doesn't do this. But that's
| just my guess - I'm too lazy to pull an SDR and listen to the
| radio traffic to confirm.
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| You can configure the geofencing locations where it won't
| alarm in the 'Find My' app.
| pinkmuffinere wrote:
| >it is not supposed to start chirping unless it is out of
| range of your phone for at least 8 days, and not in one of
| the predefined geofence regions you can setup where it won't
| chirp.
|
| Does it even chirp then? This is news to me, I have an airtag
| in my car and have certainly left it for 2 weeks during
| vacations. I've never heard the airtag chirp unless I make it
| play a sound through "Find My"
| UniverseHacker wrote:
| Your home is usually automatically geofenced, so if you
| left it there it shouldn't chirp. If you parked your car
| elsewhere, e.g. an airport lot it was probably chirping
| while you were gone, but you wouldn't hear it because you
| weren't there.
| pinkmuffinere wrote:
| oh lol interesting. I wonder how many people I have been
| annoying with the constant sound. This seemed like a
| perfect setup, but apparently not.
| lelandbatey wrote:
| They only chirp when disturbed (when separated from their
| paired device). I've got an iPad paired to a set on my
| keys, no iPhone. If I let the iPad die, eventually the
| airtag will start chirping when I pick up my keys, but
| when I'm not touching them they don't chirp.
| MikeRichardson wrote:
| I have an AirTag in wallet. Every month or so it will chirp
| for no obvious reason. My phone might be with me, or
| upstairs, or whatever. It's just random.
| indrora wrote:
| Yes, actually. It's not a panacea, but it's a foothold.
|
| Nearly all my hardside cases have an airtag stuffed in one of
| the "Surface Mount" kits from ElevationLab. it _looks_ like a
| pressure valve on the other side, and I might replace them with
| Security mounts if I 'm really worried. Having those was a
| FANTASTIC way to track my cases as I left them with a (trusted)
| friend to be shipped along some other Very High Value gear.
| Being able to see what was going on (and know when it had
| reached its destination) was invaluable. On the way back, I
| could see my luggage as it slugged its way through the airport
| luggage handling system. It's not real-time but good enough for
| rough location.
|
| A friend of mine was able to locate their stolen vehicle down
| to the block and then drone-find the vehicle from there, call
| the cops, and ended up busting an interstate chop shop in the
| process. The AirTag consistently got gasps of updates from
| passing vehicles and the neighbor's HomePod.
|
| All this because she had hidden an airtag in the gas cap.
|
| There are airlines that are encouraging people to put
| airtags/tiles/samsung trackers on their checked luggage because
| it helps them keep the airport handlers in check. A prime
| example of this is flying with guns (yes, you can fly with
| guns!) and how having an airtag made it EASIER to recover the
| firearm: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OHyb2amIkzo (This
| happened AGAIN, by the way:
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBngUc3rmY0 -- Yes, airlines
| are TERRIBLE about handling these things!)
| throwaway2037 wrote:
| Wow, those surface mount kits are pretty cool. I found them
| here: https://www.elevationlab.com/products/tagvault-surface-
| secur...
|
| That same company also makes the 10 year AirTag battery. I am
| surprised that no one has released a 3D model to print. It
| would be popular with DIYers.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > There are airlines that are encouraging people to put
| airtags/tiles/samsung trackers on their checked luggage
| because it helps them keep the airport handlers in check.
|
| They'd rather do _anything_ than pay airport handlers better
| lol
| comradesmith wrote:
| You can disable the speaker physically, it's not too difficult
| quitit wrote:
| >Are AirTags actually useful for anti-theft purposes?
|
| For small items where the airtag is merely present, it can be
| useful from the perspective of being alerted when an item is
| left behind or taken away from your surroundings. Much theft
| crime is opportunistic, such as forgetting a wallet behind in a
| restaurant, or dropping it in a street. Airtags are useful in
| that regard as the "left behind" alerts are reasonably timely,
| and tracking an item down works well. This works because you
| realise it's gone and find it before someone else does.
|
| While there are still plenty of examples of people using
| airtags for recovery of stolen goods, that's not the main
| product intention as it is very easy to discover and disable a
| loose airtag. Some larger items however (e.g. certain bikes)
| have airtags built in which aren't easily disabled, there are
| also mounting cages which serve a similar purpose - in these
| circumstances it is a legitimate antitheft device because the
| ability to easily disable it is removed.
|
| I use airtags and my most common use of it is to ask siri to
| "jingle my keys", which alerts me to whichever coat or pair of
| jeans I've left them in (my second most common use is receiving
| an alert that I've left my umbrella behind somewhere).
|
| I also remember one occasion of leaving my keys in a taxi,
| realising immediately, and chasing it down the road - the taxi
| never saw me, and I never saw my keys again, with an airtag
| that would have played out differently. These kinds of
| situations are far more common than dealing with thievery.
| mdawwg wrote:
| Cool idea. I actually just recently changed my air tag battery
| for the first time. The FindMy app notified me when the battery
| was at 30%.
|
| Personally I'm able to risk the battery dying since the tag is on
| an inexpensive item I lose frequently, but I understand the
| annoyance of replacing the battery often.
| johnklos wrote:
| I wonder if they really don't know that Apple already has a
| product named Time Capsule.
| chili6426 wrote:
| The product you're referring to is called "AirPort Time
| Capsule" and time capsule can't be copyrighted.
| mjlee wrote:
| https://www.apple.com/legal/intellectual-
| property/trademark/...
|
| It is a registered trademark. As I understand it, common
| words or phrases can be protected within the same area.
| Colours too - https://secureyourtrademark.com/blog/t-mobile-
| magenta/
| humanpotato wrote:
| What is the point of CNC machined screws? I have only seen that
| type of thing on specialized military applications and the like.
|
| I'm sure standard rolled screws would be just fine...
| alamortsubite wrote:
| _Not technical razzle-dazzle but the sheer aesthetic
| superiority of its elegant parabolic design make the GFX-100 a
| marketing breakthrough!_
| kube-system wrote:
| Well, it is ambiguous enough of a statement that it could be
| both. Maybe rolled threads and CNC lathe finish on the head...
| to make it look nice? Rolled threads are stronger anyway.
| Zooming in, it does look like there's turning marks on the head
| of the screws.
| jonhohle wrote:
| I had the exact same thought. The screws are recessed, so
| knurling is unimportant. I love the idea and will buy some for
| the cars but give me a stainless m5, hex cap head screw, I
| don't care about the process.
| to11mtm wrote:
| If I had to guess, they had easier access to a CNC or someone
| with CNC skills vs a shop that could get them rolled screws in
| the right size within their timeframe.
|
| The 'nice' thing about CNC screws is that it's cheaper to do
| short runs. (which, on the military side, can help on some
| 'security by obscurity' lengths for revers engineering).
|
| That said Rolled screws are almost always gonna be better
| unless the die is fucked.
| myself248 wrote:
| Marketing wankery. It's _extremely_ valuable among a certain
| market, and when you look at the pricing here, oh yeah, that's
| their market.
| jmull wrote:
| I know this is useful (for something), but I'm stuck on the plot
| holes in the motivating story...
|
| Why didn't they replace the battery when the app complained?
|
| How long would a thief really keep the AirTag anyway?
|
| If the thief did keep the AirTag and you tracked them down, then
| what? A confrontation has a fairly high chance to have a worse
| result than losing some equipment. You could try to get the
| police to do it, but that's going to take more time, during which
| the thief is even more likely to ditch the AirTag.
|
| Anyway, you're really swimming upstream trying to think of
| aigtags as an antitheft device. They're really for something
| lost, not stolen. Generally, they are specifically designed to
| not work well in adversarial situations.
| Osyris wrote:
| I've been wanting exactly this for so long. I want to bury an
| AirTag in my luggage, backpack, etc. and never think about it
| again. In those scenarios, it doesn't _need_ to be tiny. I'd
| rather trade compactness for longevity.
|
| However, an AirTag attached to my keys _should_ be small and
| it's easily accessible so I don't mind swapping the battery as
| needed.
| whycome wrote:
| I fully expect Apple to release the airTag in different form
| factors. They can then also sell a whole bunch of new
| accessories. A 'pen' form factor with replaceable AAAA
| battery might be perfect for myself.
| fragmede wrote:
| They've licensed the technology, so you can get an airtag
| in, eg, the form factor of a credit card.
| gorgoiler wrote:
| Another useful form factor would be the battery itself.
| Replace one of your AAAs with an AAAirTag, albeit at the
| expense of some mAh.
| aembleton wrote:
| Great idea. You could probably use a lithium battery to
| give you similar mAh.
| dieortin wrote:
| You would lose on voltage, and your item would probably
| stop working
| 0xffff2 wrote:
| The idea would be to engineer a product that is both a
| low-capacity battery and an air tag.
| sureIy wrote:
| This is really a non-issue. Your phone literally tells you
| when the tag's battery is low. I'd rather do that once every
| 365 days than having to carry 2 AA batteries for 365
| days/year.
| Eric_WVGG wrote:
| Right, it's all about the specific use case. Some more...
|
| - These are going to be huge with boats and canoes
|
| - Toolboxes owned by professional builders, carpenters,
| plumbers
|
| - Important crates in self-storage centers.
|
| - Museums
|
| - Film sets (think big $200k cameras)
| encoderer wrote:
| There exists a small percentage of men who will go absolutely
| savage on somebody for stealing from them, and the existence of
| those people is probably a bigger crime deterrent than the
| police.
|
| So I say, shine on you crazy air tag tracking vigilante
| diamonds.
| crazydoggers wrote:
| This is called an evolutionary stable strategy. (my favorite
| type of Nash equilibrium)
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolutionarily_stable_strate.
| ..
| encoderer wrote:
| Ah yes very insightful. My comment has net 50 karma at the
| moment -- more evidence this is a stable behavior with
| majority support.
| kstrauser wrote:
| I don't want someone to put razor wire on their catalytic
| converters so that it slices thieves' fingers off. I do,
| however, wish to leave the impression with thieves that
| perhaps _my_ catalytic converter is protected by insanity
| armor.
| 0_____0 wrote:
| When I lived in California I wrapped a bunch of chain
| around the cat on my truck. Wasn't actually that secure but
| thieves see a ton of chain and padlocks and go "ehhhh keep
| moving."
| kstrauser wrote:
| I believe that. A big part of security isn't making your
| property theftproof, but making it more work than your
| neighbor's.
| dmd wrote:
| You don't have to outrun the _bear_...
| Aeolun wrote:
| Around the cat?
|
| That must mean something different than I am imagining.
| neilv wrote:
| Those Persians look like fluffy dusters, but mess with a
| man's truck that one is guarding, and it'll flip out like
| a ninja angel of bloody vengeance.
|
| When you buy a new F-150, a Persian guard cat is an even
| more essential add-on than a bed liner.
| dgfitz wrote:
| If you live in a city, yeah maybe.
|
| I have 3 removed cats in the toolbox of my truck, which I
| don't lock, and neither they nor the truck have been
| touched.
|
| I even loaned the truck out to a rando on Facebook
| marketplace when I gave a fridge away, for free. Truck
| and cats came back
| fader wrote:
| I think that in your eagerness to malign cities, you
| might have missed the joke.
| iamjackg wrote:
| The very next day?
| stephenhumphrey wrote:
| We thought he was a goner.
| 0_____0 wrote:
| I mean I live in a city now (denser than any city in the
| Bay) and I left my truck unlocked for 3 months before I
| sold it.
|
| Btw, in case this is relevant: if you have a 1st gen
| Tacoma, never sell that thing. Still miss that truck.
| dgfitz wrote:
| 96 250, non-diesel. I'll never get rid of it.
| mattmaroon wrote:
| Short for catalytic converter.
| aaron695 wrote:
| Razor wire is called that because it looks like a razor.
|
| The danger is about the pointy shape.
|
| I'd be careful climbing it, if you fall/slip it's way worse
| than barbed wire. (Not sure how to do it tactically)
|
| I don't think it's that unethical to put it around the cat
| if it's obvious. It might be a danger in an accident or
| something.
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Razor_wire
| coolspot wrote:
| > Not sure how to do it tactically
|
| A mattress thrown over
| ungreased0675 wrote:
| Off topic, but I was very pleased with how easy a catalytic
| converter shield was to install on my car. It's normally
| sold and installed by a dealer, but if you have any
| semblance of DIY skill it's straightforward.
| mattmaroon wrote:
| You'd think so, but America is the most armed country in the
| world and most of us have had something stolen. I think the
| overall sentiment is "I'm like 99% going to get away with
| this and pawn it for money" and they're right.
| comradesmith wrote:
| Not all AirTags exist within the US :)
| mattmaroon wrote:
| There are other places? Really I just assumed he meant
| here because he mentioned people getting unnecessarily
| violent.
| aksss wrote:
| The US has a monopoly on people getting unnecessarily
| violent? That seems like a trope - projecting the stats
| of a few zip codes onto a very large and diverse nation.
| happyopossum wrote:
| "and most of us have had something stolen"
|
| I'm not sure that's accurate. It may be true in large
| cities, but most people don't live in NY or SF.
|
| Yeah - the closest stat I can find works out to fewer than
| 2% of people per year are theft victims.
|
| [0] https://www.statista.com/statistics/191247/reported-
| larceny-....
| nox101 wrote:
| Given the average lifespan is ~80yrs then the average
| chance you've had something stolen over over say 40 years
| is much higher than 2%. It's 2% per year so ~45% for
| 30yrs and 55% for 40yrs?
| valleyer wrote:
| You're assuming independence, almost certainly
| incorrectly.
| nox101 wrote:
| meaning?
|
| My point isn't that those number are exact. My point is
| 2% chance per year expands to a larger number over many
| years. So saying "most people have experienced theft"
| many not be that far off. 2% is 1 in 50 but 55% is more
| than 1 in 2. My personal experience is would be 10 or 11
| in 55yrs depending on whether an attempt counts
|
| bike, bike, bike, car radio, car radio, car radio, car,
| car radio, bike, camera/dashcam/kindle, attempt (broke
| window to check for loot but didn't find anything). Still
| cost $$$ to replace window so you could say my window was
| stolen.
|
| Also I didn't just multiply by the number of years. The
| probably for 100yrs is 86% (not 100% and not 200%).
| bagels wrote:
| The events are not independent. Maybe the first time you
| leave your bike outside you learn that it will be stolen,
| and then you don't do that anymore, reducing your future
| risk.
| nox101 wrote:
| yes, and that 2% per year average figure takes that into
| account. The percent for your life is higher. You got
| robbed, do something to make it go down, it gets lower.
| Over the course of the average life, it ends up at 2% per
| year. It's probably highest around 15 to 25yrs old (have
| possessions, get robbed, learn to do differently) and
| lower at the end (except for getting robbed by scams
| which often target the elderly)
| valleyer wrote:
| For most people, the chance they are a victim of theft
| (VOT) in year 1 is correlated to the chance they are a
| VOT in year 2. So the probability that they are a VOT at
| least once in those two years is NOT simply (1 - (1 -
| 2%)^2). That formula only works when the two events are
| independent, like two coin flips.
|
| As an obviously extreme example, imagine a world where
| 98% the people live in zero-crime areas, and the rest
| live in places where they are robbed annually.
|
| In such a world, the percentage of people who were a VOT
| in a single year would be 2%, and it would not rise as
| you broadened to multiple years. (The same 2% of people
| would be targeted over and over.)
|
| This is all just a roundabout way of stating the
| unfortunate fact that some people live in bad areas.
|
| I'm sorry to hear about your experience.
| garof wrote:
| I totally believe this, but now I want to check my
| assumption. Can anyone offer pointers to supporting evidence
| or research on it? Thanks
| tonymet wrote:
| order results from consequences. it's ok if you want to be
| timid, but don't shame others for helping restore order.
| criddell wrote:
| Is fear of punishment the main reason you aren't out there
| stealing the things you want and killing those who get in
| your way?
| mihaic wrote:
| For many people, especially from some terrible cultures
| I've personally met, the odds of being punished are really
| the only deterrent.
| tonymet wrote:
| I'm a decent person, so no. But most crime is committed by
| a minority of scumbags who require consequences.
| wyager wrote:
| The question isn't enlightening, because the modal HN
| commenter isn't anything like the modal criminal
| tonymet wrote:
| i like your use of modal. if more people understood that
| criminality follows power law distribution, we would have
| better policy.
| knowitnone wrote:
| Yes
| dylan604 wrote:
| interesting. the concept of that's not yours and is
| actually someone else's isn't the most compelling reason?
| very interesting
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| That concept encompasses a ton of gray area. For example,
| did the ancestors of the person you are stealing from
| enslave your ancestors? Or more simply, are you or your
| children going to go hungry?
|
| At the limit, the rule is always might makes right. Until
| then, the question is how much are you willing to give up
| to re-order the status quo? (A reordering that may or may
| not end up in your favor)
| dylan604 wrote:
| I'm not really sure what you're trying to say. You're
| saying a double negative makes a right? Vengeance is mine
| sayeth you?
| lotsofpulp wrote:
| Almost everyone can be put into a situation where they
| rationalize a "negative" into a not negative, most easily
| visible in cases in which the item being disputed is a
| scarce resource essential to survival.
|
| > the concept of that's not yours and is actually someone
| else's isn't the most compelling reason?
|
| At its core, this concept is more of a truce where
| multiple parties agree that the costs of physical
| violence are not worth it, because the alternative is
| more acceptable. Hence the saying that "society is only 3
| or 6 or 9 meals away from revolution".
| jmull wrote:
| More plot holes! You think there are people looking to
| confront thieves in-person but are dissuaded by internet
| "shame"? Does no one have a sense of coherent narrative?
|
| Of course, I can see you just wrote that as an indirect way
| to call me chicken (a bit timid yourself, no?), but can't you
| work out a better narrative considering the context?
| tonymet wrote:
| I don't know you but I can only speak to your position. In
| the DAP Model established by Team America, it is a P
| position. The Ps are in no position to criticize the Ds
| jmull wrote:
| Assuming you're an adult, aren't you a little embarrassed
| to be calling people pussies on the internet? I mean,
| come on. You can _surely_ be better than that.
| tonymet wrote:
| No. that would also be a pussy position
| unsnap_biceps wrote:
| It only complains once that the battery is low and never again,
| I've run into a dead battery when searching for an AirTag
| multiple times.
| jakespencer wrote:
| This has not been my experience. I've had multiple AirTags
| notify me multiple times over a period of months that I
| needed to change the batteries.
| unsnap_biceps wrote:
| So last week my keys AirTag was dead, and I checked my
| notifications and I only received one notification in
| October that it had a low battery, but to be fair, I don't
| know exactly when it died between October and last week.
|
| Maybe my batteries die completely before the second
| notification triggers.
| hnlmorg wrote:
| How do you check historic notifications?
| unsnap_biceps wrote:
| I never dismiss them, so there's a huge pile on my phone.
| krysp wrote:
| Notifications can be collapsed!
|
| https://developer.apple.com/documentation/cloudkit/cksubs
| cri...
| eek2121 wrote:
| My ADHD brain would fall apart.
| dylan604 wrote:
| Maybe they need an option for people like you called
| "smoke detector mode" where it starts to annoyingly beep
| once a minute.
| climb_stealth wrote:
| Dear god please no. The kind of people who don't notice
| empty batteries also don't notice the annoying beeps. But
| I do.
|
| Apartment living can be hell when there are neighbours
| who don't replace their smoke detector batteries. I can't
| fathom how people can sleep through this loud annoying
| chirp every thirty seconds. I certainly find it hard and
| my apartment is far enough away that it's hard to
| determine where exactly the chirp is coming from.
|
| The thought of smoke-detector like beeping of airtags all
| over the place gives me the worst kind of creeps. Please
| don't give them ideas! Please!
| dylan604 wrote:
| That's easy to fix. Just carry a pocket full of 2032s,
| and offer to swap out the beeping tags near you. For a
| small nominal fee, of course. Or just for free for the
| sake of humanity or just your own sanity.
| climb_stealth wrote:
| Haha, sure. Or full vigilante style
| unsnap_biceps wrote:
| I take ownership of the fact that I didn't change the
| battery when prompted. I only stated that in my
| experience it's a single notification vs the other folks
| saying they get notified multiple times.
| crottypeter wrote:
| Maybe you only get a second notification if you dismiss
| the first?
| unsnap_biceps wrote:
| That's a fair point. I'll try to remember to dismiss next
| time and see.
| dylan604 wrote:
| maybe the "like you" was a little more pointed than
| intended but it was meant more as the royal you.
| 0898 wrote:
| I read somewhere that the AirTag doesn't actually know
| whether it's low on battery or not. The alert is just
| triggered after a preprogrammed time.
| selcuka wrote:
| This is easy to test. Just remove the battery after the
| warning, then put it back and check if it complains
| rightaway.
| maratc wrote:
| In my experience with different kinds of batteries, from
| the cheapest to the more expensive ones, the AirTag holds
| between 3 and 9 months until it starts warning about
| battery, so what you've read does not line up with my
| experience.
| cute_boi wrote:
| i wish police do honey trap more often like put expensive
| equipment. That will definitely reduce lot of crimes.
| roland35 wrote:
| Didn't that work well with car theft? I believe reading
| something like that
| colechristensen wrote:
| https://mndaily.com/190563/uncategorized/minneapolis-
| police-...
|
| It's a thing in Minneapolis, though the Kia Boys thing was
| still very real here, I don't know how much they've kept it
| up.
| throwaway48476 wrote:
| Well they're blaming the cars for being too easy to steal
| and not the thieves, so it's not going well
| mrguyorama wrote:
| The cars are objectively too easy to steal. Kia made
| several outright stupid design choices and decided not to
| spend $100 on BoM to use a tried and tested immobilizer
| that genuinely helps prevent car theft. They also put the
| key barrel switches in a location very easy to access,
| rather than deep in the guts of the steering wheel shaft
| like most manufacturers.
|
| Kia tried to save itself a few bucks by drastically
| reducing their product's security. The fact that other
| cars aren't being stolen at nearly the same rate is
| itself good evidence that the thieves are just
| opportunists.
| joshuahaglund wrote:
| I've retrieved stolen bikes, one because of an airtag. Showed
| up with a couple friends standing by but not trying to be
| intimidating. It's mostly about staying calm and telling the
| person this is mine, I'm taking it. They always say "no it's my
| friend's, you're gonna piss him off" or "I just bought this" or
| something. Maybe you offer some fraction of a "reward" to
| smooth it along and cut your losses. Don't try to start a fight
| and it generally goes OK. Also, try not to accuse them of
| stealing, they'll just get defensive. "It's someone else who is
| screwing us both, but this is mine sorry."
| nostromo wrote:
| If it's left anywhere in the open at anytime, you can
| repossess it legally as well. This happens with auto
| repossessions all the time. You don't owe anyone an
| explanation as it's yours - just take it if you can do so
| safely.
| mikeortman wrote:
| Just be careful! In SOME jurisdictions, you can get in
| trouble for 'stealing' if you take back something that was
| stolen. Possession vs Ownership are 2 different things. For
| instance, the thief may have stolen something, sold it to
| someone who bought it in good-faith, and you take it back
| from that person, it's technically theft!
|
| File a police report, go through the right channels. If you
| know its yours, call the police department non-emergency
| and explain the situation
| neilv wrote:
| This is the most useful advice: call the police non-
| emergency number, explain concisely, and ask them what to
| do.
|
| A bunch of the other suggestions, here on HN Streetwise
| ProTips, can get self and/or friends beaten, stabbed,
| and/or arrested.
| TylerE wrote:
| No, THE most useful advice is not to take legal advice
| from cops.
| neilv wrote:
| How do you think the police will give bad advice, if you
| call them up and ask what to do?
| Kinrany wrote:
| Depends on how well they do their job, it's not hard to
| imagine them saying "file a report" and then ignoring it.
| extra88 wrote:
| There are countless examples of police not knowing the
| law.
|
| If you talk to them in person, it should be to get an
| idea of what they'll do, which may or may not have
| something to do with what's legal.
|
| If you want legal advice, ask a lawyer with experience in
| the relevant area.
| neilv wrote:
| You don't want legal advice. You know where your stolen
| bike is, so you call the police. I think that's the usual
| process.
|
| Probably they will verify that the bike is yours, and
| retrieve it, or they will say that they don't have the
| resources.
|
| Are people imagining that the police will say that you
| can go take the bike, but then turn around and arrest you
| for theft?
|
| Of course, if the police tell you "finders keepers; it's
| in the Constitution", _then_ you can seek legal advice.
| sneak wrote:
| No. The police will offer you the option to come to the
| police station and fill out a report so you can get a
| police report number for your insurance claim. Nothing
| else will happen.
|
| Police don't usually investigate petty crimes.
| michaelt wrote:
| _> Are people imagining that the police will say that you
| can go take the bike, but then turn around and arrest you
| for theft?_
|
| People are imagining the police will tell you that you
| can't steal it back, when legally you can.
|
| After all, it's the police's job to keep the peace. And
| things are more peaceful if I'm not busting up thieves'
| hideouts all guns blazing like Rambo.
| wat10000 wrote:
| I'm also imagining the police telling you that you can do
| something that is actually illegal, and then you get
| prosecuted for it. "The cops said it was ok" may not be
| an adequate defense.
| TomatoCo wrote:
| A cop telling you it's okay to do something, and then
| getting arrested for it, might be one of the only times
| you can correctly claim entrapment.
| fragmede wrote:
| So all Jessie Pinkman's got to do is ask the under cover
| police if it's okay to sell them meth and then they can't
| be arrested for it?
|
| Entrapment is reserved for the police going above and
| beyond, eg "sell me meth or I'll kill your dog" where it
| can be argued that the entrapped normally would not do
| the crime.
| wat10000 wrote:
| Apparently there is "entrapment by estoppel" in which a
| government official tells you an act is legal when it
| isn't. They have to be acting as a representative of the
| government, though; undercover cops wouldn't count.
|
| I still wouldn't be very excited to try this defense in
| court.
| neilv wrote:
| That's a reasonable suspicion (though I think a lot of
| the contrarian comments are just people who want to
| complain about the police).
|
| Working with that suspicion, especially given that this
| is HN, police saying "don't go steal it back" might still
| be very good advice, regardless of legal right.
|
| For example (referring back to a scenario earlier in
| thread), I'm imagining a techbro crew, all jumping into
| one of their Teslas, and rolling up on misguided urban
| youth turf.
|
| There's already a lot of misunderstanding and animosity,
| both ways, between stereotypes. And someone's attempt at
| "show of force" just escalated it. So, who will escalate
| the stupid further, and stab or draw a gun first.
| outworlder wrote:
| They aren't even required to know the law.
| ldoughty wrote:
| Ages ago when I tried calling the police...
|
| "We cannot answer legal questions, please seek a lawyer
| for advise."
|
| I don't do anything terribly interesting, so this was
| almost certainly not an issue actually worth paying $200
| for a lawyer to answer.
| chii wrote:
| > How do you think the police will give bad advice
|
| the police will give you any advice, good or bad. They're
| not legally responsible for anything they said to you, as
| long as they're not telling you to commit a crime (in
| which case, if they did they will deny it).
|
| You can still call 'em up of course - but don't 100% just
| trust their words blindly.
| toss1 wrote:
| At this point in the US, it seems we are far better off
| asking ChatGPT or Claude than the average police station.
| joshuahaglund wrote:
| IDK where you live but where I am, unless it's an
| actively life threatening emergency, the Police will say
| they're busy. I watched a drunk driver try to drive away
| after smashing into a parked car, ripping a wheel off the
| parked car. The drunk driver kept trying to start his car
| to get away. People called the police but they said
| they're busy. Fortunately his car was totaled and
| wouldn't start either. Over an hour later someone picked
| him up. If they can't even bother to deal with an active
| drunk driver, they aren't gonna help retrieve a bike.
|
| Not saying confronting thieves is for everyone. But it's
| not necessarily as physical as you think.
| happyopossum wrote:
| Sounds like you live in a crappy big city like SF,
| Oakland, Santa Clara, etc.
|
| For the vast majority of people who live in reasonable
| cities, calling the police for something like that _will_
| get a timely response.
| weakfish wrote:
| Didn't happen in the small North Carolina town that my
| parents live in, with a very similar situation as the
| parent. So truly, YMMV. Not all places can be
| generalized.
| saagarjha wrote:
| Santa Clara, population 110,000, is a big city to you?
| bagels wrote:
| Please tell us the magical place you live in that has
| friendly, helpful police with time to investigate every
| crime.
| Alupis wrote:
| Suburbs. We get 84 squad cars showing up for noise
| complaints...
|
| Many larger cities don't have the budget to provide
| adequate police coverage. So you get this sort of "best
| effort" response.
|
| This is made worse with recent years of "defund the
| police" policies creeping into some of our larger cities.
|
| It just reinforces the Pro 2A community's saying - when
| seconds matter, help is just minutes away.
| bagels wrote:
| I live in "Suburbs" I have never seen 84 police cars
| respond to anything, even school shootings.
| chmod775 wrote:
| > IDK where you live but where I am, unless it's an
| actively life threatening emergency, the Police will say
| they're busy.
|
| Where I live the basic law/constitution establishes a
| protection duty of its citizens by the state (this
| includes their property). The police is one of the ways
| the state takes care of this duty. If the state is
| grossly negligent in this or even does nothing at all,
| the state may very well be on the hook to make the
| injured party whole. This responsibility is passed down
| and carried by individual police officers, and there have
| been cases of police officers being _personally_
| convicted of causing bodily harm for not dispatching a
| unit after a request for aid (despite them not personally
| swinging any punches)[1].
|
| Generally you'll have police show up for near anything if
| they can.
|
| [1] https://www.wz.de/panorama/nach-notruf-keine-streife-
| geschic...
| wat10000 wrote:
| In the US, it's been established by the Supreme Court
| that the police have no duty to protect anyone. They can
| it they want to, and individual departments can make it a
| policy and fire officers who fail at it, but it's not a
| fundamental requirement.
| true_religion wrote:
| I live in Arlington, VA where I once saw a purse snatcher
| being chased by 5 cops. Only to have 3 more show up after
| the guy was on the ground. They all had their own cars
| too.
|
| During COVID, I called the non emergency line police for
| a break in on my car parked on the street and the police
| showed up in minutes then searched the area frantically
| to see if the guy was still around.
|
| I don't know if they are over funded or just bored.
| Thorrez wrote:
| Someone I know's phone was stolen. He tracked it using
| the track my phone feature to a house, and contacted the
| police asking the police to help get it back. The police
| said no, it's too dangerous, not worth it.
| vorpalhex wrote:
| It's probably a bad sign if you need permission from a
| desk clerk to get your property back.
|
| It's great that you think _someone will handle that for
| you_ but it is probably a fantasy. Unfortunately you will
| probably need to self resolve. If you think it is going
| to escalate to violence, bring overwhelming force.
| nostromo wrote:
| I'd be curious what jurisdiction that is true.
|
| In my jurisdiction in the US it doesn't matter if someone
| purchased the stolen goods or not, the goods still belong
| to the owner. This is sometimes called the "nemo dat"
| rule:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nemo_dat_quod_non_habet
|
| The person buying the stolen goods would need to file a
| claim against the thief to recover their money, but the
| goods still belong to the original owner. And this is how
| it should be, since it's added reason not to buy goods
| you suspect are stolen.
|
| And yes, you should always try and work with the police
| first and foremost.
| jorvi wrote:
| That is probably mostly a common law thing, and as the
| article notes
|
| > however, in many cases, more than one innocent party is
| involved, making judgment difficult for courts and
| leading to numerous exceptions to the general rule that
| aim to give a degree of protection to bona fide
| purchasers and original owners
|
| > The person buying the stolen goods would need to file a
| claim against the thief to recover their money
|
| Generally as long as the purchase is made in good faith,
| you are wrong. It is the original owner that needs to
| file a claim against the thief.
|
| Obviously, what constitutes a sale in "good faith" is a
| rather imprecise science, although one steady element is
| the sales price: it needs to have been appropriate for
| the item. So for example a mint bicycle or antique coin
| should sell near sticker price.
| nsomaru wrote:
| The key element for a bona fide sale at common law is the
| buyer's absence of knowledge of the defective title of
| the seller.
|
| Not sure how US courts have interpreted this requirement
| but that's the onus and I believe it rests on the third
| party buyer (to show absence of knowledge through
| evidence).
|
| In that case the claim is against the thief only.
| graemep wrote:
| > in many cases, more than one innocent party is
| involved, making judgment difficult for courts and
| leading to numerous exceptions to the general rule that
| aim to give a degree of protection to bona fide
| purchasers and original owners
|
| The next sentence is:
|
| > The possession of the good of title will be with the
| original owner.
|
| So you seem to be wrong there. The innocent buyer needs
| to file a claim against the thief, the original owner
| retails their title. It is explained in more detail later
| on.
| jorvi wrote:
| No, I know our legal system quite well. You are wrong.
|
| The reason for this is so that if you buy a bicycle at,
| say, a bicycle fair and for a reasonable price, you
| shouldn't have to worry about it being yoinked from under
| you later on.
|
| Lawmakers have clarified this is choosing between two
| evils, there is no winning proposition here.
|
| So, in conclusion: the original owner needs to file the
| claim, not the third party.
| hcurtiss wrote:
| To the degree lawmakers have weighed in, as you say, can
| you point me to a citation protecting the subsequent
| purchaser? I don't practice in this area, but that is
| definitely not my understanding of the law.
| liber8 wrote:
| This guy is wrong, which is why he isn't citing any legal
| authority.
|
| As anyone who has gone to law school will tell you, you
| can only acquire the title that the seller has. If seller
| stole the goods, he doesn't have any title, so he can't
| transfer title to a subsequent buyer. See, e.g. UCC SS
| 2-403
|
| There are exceptions when it comes to those who have
| voidable title (thieves do not have voidable title).
|
| There are also cases where courts have more or less
| created exceptions close to those OP has described. For
| example, if Best Buy receives some stolen merchandise and
| sells it to good faith purchasers, courts have held that
| the victim needs to pursue the thief/Best Buy, not the
| end purchaser.
|
| But generally, OP is wrong: if you buy a stolen bike at a
| flea market, you don't get title and the owner can get
| the bike back. Think of the policy implications if the
| rule was as OP claims. All thieves would have to do is
| immediately sell stolen goods and the owners could never
| get them back. That would be absurd.
| jorvi wrote:
| > This guy is wrong, which is why he isn't citing any
| legal authority.
|
| You never asked.
|
| https://wetten.overheid.nl/BWBR0005291/2024-05-01 article
| 83 onward
|
| > As anyone who has gone to law school will tell you
|
| Sounds like you wasted $300 000 just to be wrong :)
|
| > But generally, OP is wrong: if you buy a stolen bike at
| a flea market, you don't get title and the owner can get
| the bike back.
|
| I said bike fair, not flea market.
|
| I will reiterate: the sale needs to have been in good
| faith. All the conditions for that need to have been met.
| Epa095 wrote:
| OP is just claiming that there exists juristrictions
| where his claim holds. IANALE (I am not a lawyer
| EVERYWHERE), so I can't really say that he's wrong. But
| you seem quite certain. Why?
| graemep wrote:
| "o, I know our legal system quite well. You are wrong"
|
| "Our" legal system? Do you mean all common law countries
| or a particular one?
| codys wrote:
| The commenter appears to have been referring to a
| specific law in the netherlands without stating this.
| ostacke wrote:
| Sweden is one such jurisdiction[1]. You can only retake
| what has been stolen from you if it is done shortly after
| the theft.
|
| [1] https://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sj%C3%A4lvt%C3%A4kt
| randallsquared wrote:
| ...as appropriate for a culture of Viking raids, one
| would suppose!
| lazide wrote:
| Possession truly is 9/10ths of the law in this case I
| guess?
| randunel wrote:
| Another jurisdiction example would be Romania. Even if
| the thief themselves are in possession of the property
| you own, you can be charged with theft if you steal it
| back. The law clearly delimits possession from ownership.
| easyThrowaway wrote:
| How would they even prove that if it's in the open?
| "Stolen? No idea, I've always had that bike, I just
| forgot where I left it last time. Went and got it back.
| By the way, here's the receipt."
| Xmd5a wrote:
| This happened to me. I bought a pair of headphones
| (Nuraphones) on ebay, only to have them bricked by the
| company remotely.
|
| IIRC, they had a security hole on their payment page:
| they forgot to implement SCA (strong customer
| authentification, aka 2FA for payments). Had they done
| this, the liability would have shifted onto the bank/card
| issuer. For some reason they decided to go after the
| customers in vain resentment, were acquired and their
| product was discontinued.
|
| https://www.reddit.com/r/Nuraphone/comments/8iw3he/beware
| _on...
| darreninthenet wrote:
| This wouldn't be true in the UK, you can just take it
| back and use reasonable (which would be very light in the
| circumstances) force to do so.
| srockets wrote:
| The police won't help you. It's not their job.
| wahnfrieden wrote:
| They will at best waste your time, and at worst they will
| cause you and your family harm for involving them. In
| Toronto even a stolen car is not enough to get their
| attention if you are not a high-profile business owner.
| bagels wrote:
| At best they will help you with stolen property, but that
| is rare.
| wahnfrieden wrote:
| Mythically rare. They're more likely to steal from you.
| happyopossum wrote:
| Move, or elect better local politicians. Your city is
| broken.
| sneak wrote:
| Different local politicians won't change the legal fact
| that the police have no obligation whatsoever to
| investigate or prevent crime. It's simply not in the job
| description.
| 9dev wrote:
| Err... what is their job, then, if not investigating and
| preventing crime? That pet theory with the slave patrols
| of yours, by the way, isn't it; that's a hoax. The modern
| police in the USA and other countries stems from the
| British police, which did exactly what they are supposed
| to do, since ages.
| serf wrote:
| we can't all live in Bedford Falls, and the police aren't
| there for the benefit of the every-person no matter where
| you live.
|
| it's a nice bit of propaganda that they're there for us,
| but I urge anyone with that idea to seek out and research
| the history and origins of the modern police.
|
| hint : in the US they first emerged as 'slave patrols',
| and then later modernized into 'industrial labor
| controls', and things weren't all that much better across
| the ocean in London with Sir Robert Peel and his version
| of the 'police service'.
| gottorf wrote:
| > the history and origins of the modern police
|
| > in the US they first emerged as 'slave patrols'
|
| > Sir Robert Peel and his version of the 'police service'
|
| I assume that prior to the "modern" police, policing was
| still necessary, since there were lawbreakers and
| troublemakers since time immemorial. What do you regard
| as the substantive difference between the pre-modern
| police force and the modern? Did the former somehow serve
| "all of us" better than the latter?
| lazide wrote:
| Typically law enforcement was DIY, done by a mob, or done
| at the behest/in the interest of a local strongman (king
| or lord).
|
| That led to extremely selective enforcement at the best
| of times.
|
| The idea of a professional, independent force that served
| the public and preferred formal laws was the innovation.
|
| Previously you'd need to either deal with it yourself, or
| track down a local patron and hope they cared enough to
| assign some muscle to deal with it on your behalf - and
| didn't favor the perp more. Think 'Godfather'. In those
| cases, written law was rarely a priority either.
| throwaway48476 wrote:
| Better to get rid of the police and let people get actual
| justice themselves.
| DaSHacka wrote:
| I'm sure that would end wonderfully.
| dennis_jeeves2 wrote:
| We need humans 2.0 for that to happen.
| GeekyBear wrote:
| It depends on the city.
|
| > Police to give out free air tag tracking devices to
| combat rise in stolen vehicles
|
| https://www.princewilliamtimes.com/news/police-to-give-
| out-f...
| FabHK wrote:
| I was in Singapore in 2013 and there was a big sign on a
| street saying:
|
| Crime Alert
|
| THEFT OF BICYCLE
|
| AT THIS NEIGHBOURHOOD
|
| ON 20 MARCH 2013 @ 7 AM
|
| Witnesses, please call Tanglin Police Division
|
| (phone number redacted)
| chii wrote:
| > it's technically theft!
|
| i hope that isn't true. A buyer of stolen goods needs to
| accept that a consequence of it is that they could lose
| possession of said good. This is why for expensive goods,
| you should ensure you're not buying stolen goods.
| mosselman wrote:
| Here in the Netherlands if you purchase something and
| cant reasonably know that it was stolen, then you become
| the legal owner.
|
| It is logical that it works that way. Proving something
| is owned by someone else can be quite hard for certain
| items.
| harha wrote:
| Some jurisdictions are great at protecting all the wrong
| people
| Nakagawa835 wrote:
| Helpful knowledge, thanks!
| wouldbecouldbe wrote:
| the police often won't do anything
| MagicMoonlight wrote:
| Please evidence this claim.
|
| I know it's false in the UK and I'd imagine it is false
| in any country where the law is based on UK law.
|
| Failing to retrieve it at the time is going to mean
| losing it forever. If you find a crackhead with your
| phone and wait for someone else to retrieve it, that
| phone is long gone.
| victorbjorklund wrote:
| Not everywhere. In Sweden that would be a crime (a little
| bit depending on what you mean left in the open).
| kleton wrote:
| What kind of anarcho-tyranny is that?
| j-krieger wrote:
| European countries sometimes have a rather repulsive
| legal system that provides far too much protection to
| perpetrators.
| unreal37 wrote:
| There is no concept in American Law of "acquiring stolen
| stuff legally".
|
| If you buy something that was stolen, the original owner
| has the right to get it back without compensation to you.
| rullopat wrote:
| I don't know somewhere else but, in Italy, buying /
| getting stolen stuff from somebody else is a specific
| kind of crime as well. You need to give a solid
| explanation why you have a stolen good.
| balls187 wrote:
| Similar, in the US "knowingly" receiving stolen property
| is a crime.
| Ray20 wrote:
| Protection from what? No actions are taken against
| perpetrators' interests.
| wjnc wrote:
| The logic is that the current possessor might have
| acquired the product bona fide and is not necessarily the
| thief. In order to assess this, you cannot repurpose the
| product yourself, but need the cops and court involved.
| It's the oppossite of anarcho-tyranny, it's a law
| favoring orderly and non-violent solutions of real world
| capitalist conundrums. Private repossession of stolen
| property in a 'bear arms' society... are accidents
| waiting to happen.
|
| In reality things are not so stiff. My dads bag was
| stolen from the train. The thief was apprehended on the
| station. He got his bag back from the cops because it had
| identifiable information in it. Perhaps a bit light on
| evidence that the thief was not the owner, but it's not
| always overly complicated. I think the thief got the
| right nudge.
| j1elo wrote:
| > _the current possessor might have acquired the product
| bona fide and is not necessarily the thief. In order to
| assess this, you cannot repurpose the product yourself,
| but need the cops and court involved._
|
| A fun thought experiment is that in the time you might
| have left your car parked in the street, it might be
| stolen, sold bona fide, then (by happenstance) parked in
| the same area, so one day you just go back to it and
| drive it away.
|
| I guess in a more practical sense, you could claim that's
| (more or less) what happened after recovering your
| possessions after having them stolen... what would happen
| in that edge case?
| Ray20 wrote:
| >acquired the product bona fide
|
| Does not change anything. I mean poor guy, became a
| victim of a fraudster, but what does my bike have to do
| with it?
|
| >you cannot repurpose the product yourself
|
| This is not repurposing, this is its prevention.
|
| >solutions of real world capitalist conundrums
|
| There is no conundrums, it is pure tyranny.
| transcriptase wrote:
| Wait until you hear about Canada. The crown will ruin
| your life by dragging you through the courts for years
| for something like that, then drop the charges when it's
| obvious they're going to lose as to not set any precedent
| to be used against them in the future.
| afavour wrote:
| It makes sense to me... mostly. The person currently in
| possession might have purchased it from the thief so
| taking it from them leaves them in a hole, not the thief.
|
| More broadly I think it does make a certain sort of sense
| that a theft should be resolved by the police. Find your
| item and want it back? Get the police involved. It's just
| that these days we're all so used the police being
| completely ineffectual that taking matters into your own
| hands is the only "sensible" solution.
| t0mas88 wrote:
| In the Netherlands buying stolen goods is a crime. If you
| knew or could reasonably have known it was stolen (e.g. a
| bike with a broken lock, no keys and a low price) you
| risk a serious fine. If you didn't know it was stolen you
| just loose the goods. Technically you then have a claim
| on the seller, but of course you're not going to get
| anything.
|
| So stealing your own thing back without the police
| involved may technically be illegal, but practically if
| the airtag tells you where your stolen bike is and you
| have the keys, skip the police and take it. Nothing will
| happen. The thief or their client is not going to call
| the police since that gets them arrested or fined.
|
| Of course you can't go into the thief's house to retrieve
| your things. Then you do need to call the police first.
| But the one case I know about someone doing that for a
| stolen iPhone based on Find My app location, the police
| showed up quickly and arrested the thief + found lots of
| other stolen things in their possession.
| paulddraper wrote:
| So when both people think they have legally purchased it,
| they go back and forth stealing it?
| altacc wrote:
| This is my experience as well. Most people don't want
| confrontation. I found my stolen bike when somebody was out
| riding it. I told them it was stolen from me, they said "OK"
| and handed it over. It was either them who stole it or they
| bought it suspiciously cheap and knew it was stolen.
| wyager wrote:
| "Altruistic punishment in humans" -
| https://www.nature.com/articles/415137a
|
| It's good for society, and (in the evolutionary equilibrium)
| results in massively reduced defection, if people are willing
| to take on high risk to aggressively punish defectors.
| elzbardico wrote:
| A lot of those thiefs are not hardened criminals, because the
| payoff for this kind of crime is usually a small fraction of
| the actual value of the things stolen. Most of time it is the
| average wimpy addict and the reason he resort to this kind of
| criminal activity is preciselly because he is not ready for the
| violent potential of more profitable criminal activities.
|
| If you relativelly fit, and have some experience with actual
| fights or training in martial arts, it is not that stupid to
| try to recover your stuff.
|
| If you don't feel confortable with the prospect of any kind of
| violent confrontation or don't have the street smarts to
| evaluate the risk potential of saidconfrontation, you'd still
| have the hope that the police would do something anyway if you
| have the location of your goods.
|
| Really, at some time we need to stop glorifying cowardice and
| reclaim a little bit of dignity.
| rahimnathwani wrote:
| Really, at some time we need to stop glorifying cowardice and
| reclaim a little bit of dignity.
|
| As a society, yes, but do you want to be the one to sacrifice
| your life or livelihood, for the slim chance of having an
| impact on society? A lot of those thiefs are
| not hardened criminals
|
| Right, but I wonder how long a stolen bike is in the original
| thief's possession, before it's sold to a fence? And perhaps
| the fence is in better shape or has buddies for protection
| against retheft?
| citizenpaul wrote:
| >stop glorifying cowardice
|
| I mostly agree. I don't think its cowardice most of the time
| though. Its that laws now favor criminals if you attempt to
| do anything yourself. Its become public policy that "rich"
| people buying things can simply absorb the loss and the
| police don't even have to do anything because no one bothers
| to report it. The police win because crime stats go down,
| thiefs win because they get the goods, the victim absorbs all
| the cost and if they try to do anything the victim goes to
| jail for whatever charges that made the police have to get up
| and work.
| netsharc wrote:
| > Its that laws now favor criminals if you attempt to do
| anything yourself.
|
| That just reads like a general "this is why I'm a coward"
| excuse.
|
| Also what you want is spelled "It's".
| spacebanana7 wrote:
| It's a good excuse because it's a fair description of why
| cowardice is rational in many western legal contexts.
| weakfish wrote:
| Can I get a source on any of these claims?
|
| Tbf, I am generally anti-police in the sense that they're
| pretty institutionally bad at preventing or deterring crime
| in the current model, but I don't really understand the
| argument you're making here
| zonkerdonker wrote:
| Not a source (and I'm also not GP), but 'duty to retreat'
| laws exist even in many states in the US.
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duty_to_retreat
|
| Just google property crime + [any largeish US city] +
| reddit and youll find dozens of anecdotal stories from
| citizens.
|
| Property crime seems to have essentially become a problem
| dealt with exclusively by citizens. Hell, SPD wouldnt
| even do anything to help when my car was stolen a few
| years ago. I got a call from the bar where it was
| abandoned and had to have it towed myself.
|
| I think the argument GP was making was that of
| incentives. Police department have essentially zero
| incentive to devote time+manpower to petty theft or
| property crime, so the easiest solution is to simply
| encourage citizens to not 'resist' so to speak. If you
| get mugged, its a lot easier to deal with as a police
| officer if you simply hand them your wallet, vs starting
| a fist/knife/gun fight in the streets.
| michaelt wrote:
| I don't agree with citizenpaul
|
| But I do know if you're a homeless drug addict and you
| commit a crime that makes the cops throw you in jail -
| that's three meals a day, somewhere warm to sleep, and no
| lost income because you didn't have any income.
|
| Whereas if you're a member of the middle class and you
| commit the same crime and get thrown in the same jail?
| Mucho lost income, you can't pay your mortgage, you get
| fired for not showing up at work, and as a convict your
| employment prospects become much, much worse.
|
| So a "rational" member of the middle class might opt not
| to fight a homeless drug addict over $500 simply because
| they've got a lot more to lose.
| mrguyorama wrote:
| >that's three meals a day, somewhere warm to sleep
|
| I don't know why people always parrot this like a fact.
| Plenty of prisons serve only two woefully inadequate
| meals a day (like, Fyre festival sandwich levels of
| inadequate) and prisons generally have atrocious climate
| control. In the southern states, they don't have air
| conditioning and it gets genuinely dangerous for the
| prisoners.
|
| Some jurisdictions give the Warden a budget for feeding
| the prisoners, and any dollar they don't spend, they get
| to KEEP. This predictably results in malnourished
| prisoners, but Americans do not have the empathy to care
| most of the time.
| MikeRichardson wrote:
| > any dollar they don't spend, they get to KEEP
|
| I'd love a source on that.
| giantg2 wrote:
| "If you relativelly fit, and have some experience with actual
| fights or training in martial arts, it is not that stupid to
| try to recover your stuff."
|
| Anyone with actual experience will tell you that no amount of
| training will save you from the lucky stab/shot/unknown.
| Sure, you might win 9/10 times, but is that worth it?
| Sometimes maybe, other times no. Usually it's better to
| notify police and let the system handle it. If you handle it
| yourself, the system in many jurisdictions will fuck you just
| as bad as the real criminal unless you actively witnessed it
| or were attacked first.
| outworlder wrote:
| > Really, at some time we need to stop glorifying cowardice
| and reclaim a little bit of dignity.
|
| And getting into a physical fight with real injury potential
| because of an item?
|
| If it is a cheap thing it is not worth it. If it is more
| expensive usually the law is on your side. Either way,
| there's no need for physical confrontation.
|
| > the reason he resort to this kind of criminal activity is
| preciselly because he is not ready for the violent potential
| of more profitable criminal activities.
|
| That's a gamble. What if the reason is that, although the
| thief _could_ be violent, they were smart enough to realize
| that they can get more results with less personal risk? In
| which case, your 'martial arts' training is meaningless when
| you have a knife or a bullet going through you.
| happyopossum wrote:
| > Either way, there's no need for physical confrontation.
|
| Nahh, you just outsource your physical confrontation to a
| cop. You still belief in confrontation for resolving the
| issues, you're just being a coward and not doing it
| yourself.
| MathMonkeyMan wrote:
| Which physical confrontations you handle yourself and
| which ones you outsource to police is a difficult
| question. The problem is not so much how you answer the
| question, but how many people in a large society will
| choose the "wrong" one.
|
| And I think it's better not to refer to strangers on the
| internet as cowards. How would you feel if somebody
| responded to your opinion by calling you a name?
| mattmaroon wrote:
| Eh. Recognition that the state having a monopoly on violence
| is a better system than individuals exercising it isnt
| cowardice. This is one area where cops actually can and will
| do what you want them to, might as well let them if possible.
|
| And yeah maybe any reasonable human can beat up most
| tweakers, but one could have a knife or gun. Even if that's a
| 5% shot, my life is worth more than 20x my bike.
| paganel wrote:
| Being fit doesn't do anything against a knife or a fire-gun,
| is not being a coward, it'a just the logical conclusion. The
| people who want to stay fit in order to potentially fight
| burglars/thieves are doing it wrong, they should train in
| either gun use or how to better handle a knife. And, of
| course, have an expensive lawyer at the ready in case
| something goes wrong and you actually get to physically hurt
| said thief/burglar.
| bagels wrote:
| It is actually pretty stupid to try to recover things.
|
| I knew a guy that tried to stop someone from stealing his
| neighbor's car stereo.
|
| He was extremely fit, young, and a fighter.
|
| That didn't stop him from getting stabbed to death by the
| thief.
|
| You can decide your life is worth a $100 car stereo, but I
| know mine is worth more than that.
| theshackleford wrote:
| > If you relativelly fit
|
| Most people are not this
|
| > have some experience with actual fights or training in
| martial arts
|
| And significant amounts of people also have neither of these
| things. At the very least "martial arts" training is
| particularly unlikely.
|
| I'm the only one I know in my circle with practical fight
| experience and it's because I grew up in shitty places. That
| probably says more about the privileged area I now live, and
| the kinds of people it attract though to be fair.
| reaperducer wrote:
| _You could try to get the police to do it, but that 's going to
| take more time, during which the thief is even more likely to
| ditch the AirTag._
|
| During the most recent American election I saw at least three
| news stories on television about campaign sign thieves being
| tracked down through the use of AirTags put in one of the
| signs. To my surprise, in each case the police were right
| there, and in two of the cases, the signs were still loaded in
| the thieves' cars. So it does seem to work.
|
| _Anyway, you 're really swimming upstream trying to think of
| aigtags as an antitheft device._
|
| They aren't anti-theft devices as in padlocks. But the more
| often that thieves start wondering if the thing they're taking
| might have an AirTag in it, they might start reconsidering some
| of the petty thefts.
|
| It's like a surveillance camera. A camera, itself, can't stop a
| crime. But the possibility that someone's watching can act as a
| mild deterrent.
| HPsquared wrote:
| Aren't the news stories subject to survivorship bias though?
| They wouldn't be as likely to report a boring "sign stolen,
| thief unknown" story.
| reaperducer wrote:
| _Aren 't the news stories subject to survivorship bias
| though? They wouldn't be as likely to report a boring "sign
| stolen, thief unknown" story._
|
| Not really. "Survivorship bias" is just the HN cliche of
| the quarter, and doesn't apply in nearly as many situations
| as posters on this forum would like.
|
| There were plenty of other stories of campaign signs being
| stolen, both in the most recent election, and in previous
| ones. I'd call it more "perception bias." You only know
| about the AirTag campaign signs stories because you're
| viewing it through the lens of HN, and not a broader view
| of media coverage of the issue.
| runjake wrote:
| > They're really for something lost, not stolen. Generally,
| they are specifically designed to not work well in adversarial
| situations.
|
| In practice, AirTags tell you where it is, which is useful for
| lost or stolen items.
|
| What you do with that information is a whole other topic
| outside this scope.
|
| I've recovered or helped recover several stolen items located
| with an AirTag and I'll keep on buying them as long as they're
| good for both.
|
| So far in the cases I've been involved, the thief wasn't aware
| of the AirTag. In some cases, they had iPhones on them. I'm not
| sure why they did not get an "AirTag is following you"
| notification, or why they ignored it.
| NoPicklez wrote:
| In all seriousness, if I put an Airtag on my $6k bike and it
| was stolen and it showed where it was. I'd be getting that bike
| back and not worrying too much about a confrontation.
|
| Worst case scenario I report it to police directly and it tells
| them exactly where it is.
|
| If something is stolen, if I don't know where it is that makes
| the problem 10x worse. At the very least the airtag shows where
| that item is (unless it has been found and thrown away).
| theteapot wrote:
| > Worst case scenario I report it to police directly and it
| tells them exactly where it is.
|
| Yes, and then wait 6 months for the police to get around to
| picking it up ...
| NoPicklez wrote:
| Well I'd rather be able to file a report with a location
| and proof of purchase than filing a report without having a
| single clue where it is
| weakfish wrote:
| That doesn't mean the system shouldn't be improved,
| though?
| NoPicklez wrote:
| I never said it shouldn't be improved, in fact I didn't
| have any problems with it to begin with. That was the
| commenter above me.
| wahnfrieden wrote:
| They will never get around to it. They don't even pursue
| stolen cars.
| NoPicklez wrote:
| When you say "they" I assume you are talking about your
| police department and not perhaps a department in another
| location or country?
| wahnfrieden wrote:
| No
| NoPicklez wrote:
| So you're speaking on behalf of all police departments
| wahnfrieden wrote:
| Thanks
| pests wrote:
| Not sure what type of mad max world you live in.
| wahnfrieden wrote:
| Toronto & NYC
| dannyw wrote:
| Welp, perhaps demand better from your elected officials.
|
| I live in a town. A few years ago, I had my car broken
| into with my bag and laptop stolen. Cops took
| fingerprints and forensics, found a match in a database,
| visited the suspect, arrested him (as he couldn't explain
| why his fingerprints was in my car), searched, found, and
| reclaimed my property.
| wahnfrieden wrote:
| Ok
| dheera wrote:
| I had a bunch of equipment stolen from a car in Mountain
| View and the lazy cops just dropped the case.
|
| Those guys probably went on to steal more shit from
| someone else.
| egypturnash wrote:
| My experience of an airtag on my stolen $300 bike was that
| the tag showed up in a location the cops told me was about a
| block away from a notorious chop shop in the city. I just
| sighed and bought a new bike.
| NoPicklez wrote:
| $300 I probably wouldn't bother, but a pricey bike I
| absolutely would or better yet get insurance
| dheera wrote:
| Maybe a stinky bike lock like this would be better protection
| for a bike.
|
| https://skunklock.com/
| fsckboy wrote:
| > _stuck on the plot holes in the motivating story... How long
| would a thief really keep the AirTag anyway?_
|
| you discover something has been stolen (or lost), and not
| knowing exactly when it happened _but curious about that too_ ,
| you immediately try to look up where it was last seen and if
| it's still tracking. What's the problem with that scenario,
| sounds perfectly reasonable.
|
| he wants the long battery not because the thief is going to
| carry it around for 10 years, but simply so that it will more
| likely to be charged and location tracking at the time it is
| stolen from the owner.
| bhaney wrote:
| > so that it will more likely to be charged and location
| tracking at the time it is stolen
|
| Unless you're ignoring/suppressing the low battery
| notifications for months, that's already overwhelmingly
| likely.
| fsckboy wrote:
| i don't like changing the batteries in my smoke detectors.
| it's too frequent. they remind me, it doesn't go unnoticed,
| it's not that they are inadvertently running out, _i don 't
| like doing it, every time is too frequently_
|
| in the story the guy told, his batteries were dead; he
| wishes they weren't. People are allowed to have different
| preferences, it's not a plot hole in the story.
| phil21 wrote:
| > A confrontation has a fairly high chance to have a worse
| result than losing some equipment.
|
| Maybe. I agree it's a risk I'd ask myself more than a few times
| if I'm willing to take these days, but in my youth and when I
| was less economically secure I never had a problem taking
| matters like these into my own hands.
|
| Every time I've tracked down a stolen item (phones were the
| most common with early tracking apps, but before that I've gone
| after stolen bikes, Discmans, etc.) the thief simply gave up
| the item without so much as a verbal altercation. The surprise
| that someone was crazy enough to call them on their bullshit
| was enough to shock them into just complying. Perhaps some
| shame as well, I'm not certain.
|
| This has been true since my early teen days when I worked for a
| small retail store where the owner was way crazier than I ever
| have been. He took me along on some "repo" trips where folks
| had written bad checks against expensive items. These were
| generally in bad neighborhoods and I was certain he was going
| to get shot - but he never did. Some yelling was the most I
| witnessed and every time we got the items in question back safe
| and sound - usually with the person in question helping to load
| them into the truck.
|
| I'd probably still track an item down and knock on someone's
| door if I was confident it was the correct location. These days
| it's basically your only recourse, and despite the relatively
| minor economic loss vs. my income at this point in my life I
| think it's important for societal reasons. When everyone simply
| gives up and lets the criminals and petty thieves "win" without
| so much as challenging on them, society rapidly crumbles.
| Relying on law enforcement is a last resort, even though the
| modern day take is they are the front line response. We see how
| well that is going. Poorly.
|
| If I owned a retail shop I'd also confront any shoplifters and
| back up any of my staff who decided to do the same themselves.
| I understand this might end up costing me more money and make
| insurance difficult. Punishing such behavior for "liability"
| reasons is utterly asinine. It should be rewarded, but not
| encouraged or forced on employees by ownership. When I stopped
| shoplifters in the 90's at the shops I worked at, it wasn't
| because I thought my low pay was worth the personal risk. I did
| it because it was the right thing to do and I knew the owners
| had my back if anything bad happened. Firing clerks for giving
| a damn about society is one of my huge pet peeves of modern
| life. And yes, I am well aware of the risk and horrible
| outcomes that rarely happen in such situations.
|
| So tldr; I see it as a duty to society to make an attempt at
| challenging these things for myself and friends that ask for
| help. Yes, that does incur some personal risk to my safety that
| cannot be squared with the economic reward. It's a tradeoff I,
| and others, have calculated for ourselves.
|
| It's utterly corrosive to actual hard working folks doing the
| right thing to be forced to watch some asshole professional
| thief push out a cart full of power tools from Home Depot.
| Knowing full well that they would be fired if they so much got
| in the way of the cart. It's ridiculous we've normalized such
| things and justified it with the liability fairy. The executive
| class has entirely failed society on this point. If someone
| wants to take on the personal risk, the response should be high
| praise - not punishment. You get more of what you incentivize.
| avidiax wrote:
| I have some sympathy for your argument, but I think you are
| fundamentally misunderstanding the power dynamic between
| citizens and criminals.
|
| Some of the petty thieves will think twice if they hear about
| other thieves getting beat up. Many of them will simply
| respond with violence.
|
| Look at Latin American countries where thieves will shoot you
| dead for an iPhone.
|
| The bicycle thieves are going to steal no matter what. They
| have to score their next hit. Better that they can do that
| armed only with an angle grinder rather than a pistol, too.
|
| And if someone decides to turn a bicycle theft into a murder,
| well, the bicycle thief can usually "live off the land" much
| easier than you can. When you are used to living on the
| street and all you need is your next hit, it's much harder to
| catch you for murder, even if you can be identified.
|
| In a fight where you have more to lose, are an order of
| magnitude more likely to be held accountable, and your
| opponent is irrational, effectively anonymous, and probably
| more practiced in violence than you, escalation seems
| unfavorable even if it leaves you with a shitty feeling.
| physhster wrote:
| I've had AirTags in my luggage that seemed ok, but the
| batteries died mid-trip which was somewhat suboptimal. Longer
| battery life seems like a good selling point vs. replacing
| those annoying CR2032 before every trip.
| bobthepanda wrote:
| In fact IIRC the first thing that happened when AirTags were
| announced were a bunch of concerns that surreptitious AirTags
| were usable as stalking devices and this seems to bring that
| concern up again.
| kwar13 wrote:
| Come to latam and you'll see some intense confrontation when
| something gets stolen. I was in a hostel when someone broke
| into lockers and they tracked him to the a bus station and got
| all their stuff back + dude in handcuffs to police station.
| a12k wrote:
| I searched Google maps for Latam but could only find an
| airline. Where is this?
| telotortium wrote:
| Latin America
| herval wrote:
| > If the thief did keep the AirTag and you tracked them down,
| then what?
|
| We recently recovered a laptop simply because it was tracked.
| Took the location to the police and they did the rest. It's
| most definitely an anti-theft device in my case
| windexh8er wrote:
| I'll explain why I want this.
|
| I don't use the Apple ecosystem as my primary, but I do have a
| bunch of tags I use in different cases for different items.
| Some of my items are things like motorsports vehicles or
| trailers and other things that are around but often out of
| sight.
|
| If something were to go missing I may not notice immediately.
| It also seems the batteries in AirTags die faster in areas
| where climate control isn't the norm. Changing these out every
| year is a pain because some are hidden in areas that aren't
| easy to get to.
|
| I hope these work well. And I was pleasantly surprised by the
| price point. Already ordered!
|
| Also... I already own ElevationLabs Surface Mounts that I use
| and they are well made products. I love finding brands like
| this because it's not the norm on outlets like Amazon anymore.
| So when I find a good product I'm more than happy to keep
| buying their products, the premium is worth it.
| stogot wrote:
| I've had home sensors warn me of dead batteries for two years
| and I'm too lazy to replace them. I'd kick myself if something
| happened
| bagels wrote:
| I have an AirTag, and no iphone. I used my wife's tablet to set
| it up. I don't think I will get timely battery alerts from it
| because I'm not bought in to the apple ecosystem fully.
| mschuster91 wrote:
| > Why didn't they replace the battery when the app complained?
|
| Many people routinely clear out all notifications due to the
| noise, and Find My notifications are part of that.
| KaiserPro wrote:
| > Why didn't they replace the battery when the app complained?
|
| because life gets in the way. You have a bunch of batteries and
| forget where you put them, or you walk inside and get
| distracted.
|
| I have a tag in my suitcase, which is/has run out of battery. I
| dont use it that often, so I should really replace it. but I
| have forgotten.
| unreal37 wrote:
| This "just let people steal your stuff, it's not worth
| pursuing" logic is fine for some, not fine for others.
|
| Also, thieves are dumb. Don't expect them to find all the
| tracking devices in minutes.
| eek2121 wrote:
| You'd be surprised how dumb people are, many don't even know
| what they are or look like.
|
| Air Tags are also concealable, and on my backpack I have one
| inside the strap. You can't tell it is there.
| tobyjsullivan wrote:
| Re: changing batteries.
|
| - To change a battery, you need to not only see the
| notification but also be physically proximal to the device and
| have a fresh battery available. It can take some time to meet
| all these conditions and sometimes you simply forget.
|
| - A single air tag only needs the battery replaced roughly
| every six months. However, the rate of replacements increases
| as you are managing more air tags. It's easy to be replacing a
| battery every few weeks.
|
| - Replacement fatigue is a thing. At some point, we just get
| lazy.
|
| I keep my BBQ on my front patio, directly in front of my
| battery-powered Ring camera. The battery on that camera needs
| to be recharged and replaced every two months. I try to get to
| it as quickly as I can - ideally during the low-battery state
| and before the battery dies completely. One time, however, I
| got lazy/forgot. Two days after the battery died, my BBQ was
| stolen.
|
| Re: antitheft device
|
| You're right. Apple markets AirTags for recovering lost items,
| not stolen ones. Nevertheless, they can be very effective for
| recovering stolen items. My local police department will aid in
| recovering stolen property. If the item has an AirTag that
| pings a location, an officer will investigate. In the case of
| my BBQ, the officer was willing to look for it same-day but,
| alas, I did not have an AirTag on it.
|
| This product actually helps as it effectively hides the air
| tag. This makes it less likely that a thief would find and
| discard the airtag. They'd only be looking for it if their
| iPhone notifies them and, even then, they may not be able to
| discriminate which item contains the tag. Best case scenario:
| they discard the entire stolen unit, keeping the air tag with
| it.
| shortstuffsushi wrote:
| > physically proximal to the device and have a fresh battery
| available
|
| I think it's also worth saying, these batteries aren't the
| standard AA batteries most people on hand, they're 2032 (I
| believe? or 2025) "quarter batteries" which isn't something a
| lot of people just keep around. So in addition to being
| physically proximal, once they've figured out how to open it
| up and being surprised by the "weird battery," they've also
| got to remember which it was when presented with a wall of
| similar looking "quarter batteries" at the store (see: my
| lack of assurity even having previously replaced these).
| 0xffff2 wrote:
| > which isn't something a lot of people just keep around
|
| Surely it's something that airtag owners keep around in
| bulk? I don't have any airtags/tiles/etc, but I can't
| imagine owning just one. As soon as I have one, I might as
| well have 6 or 12. If I'm replacing 2*n batteries per year,
| even if n is just 2 or 3, I'm buying these things in bulk!
| cruffle_duffle wrote:
| > hey're 2032 (I believe? or 2025) "quarter batteries"
| which isn't something a lot of people just keep around.
|
| This might be slightly tangent but I used to think that.
| Except now I have a kid. Do you have any idea how many
| crazy weird battery sizes some of these new toys take? I
| think I now have like 4 or 5 different sized button
| batteries in my inventory.
|
| "Back in my day" everything was either AA, C or D. These
| days, that isn't the case anymore. Only "big things" take
| "big batteries" like AA->D or they have a few built-in
| 18650's and a generic charger onboard.
| awwstn wrote:
| without commenting on the rest of it, i can share anecdotally
| that i currently have 3 dead airtags that i have been
| procrastinating updating the batteries on
| wpearse wrote:
| We put AirTags in road cases/Pelican flight cases packed with
| AV/IT equipment. Pelican makes a stick-on AirTag holder that
| works well.
|
| We've found the AirTags work just as well as LTE/4G GPS
| trackers --- with no-ongoing costs, better battery life (we get
| 6-9 months on the AirTags, 4-6 weeks on the GPS trackers), and
| AirTags are 1/5 the cost of an LTE tracker.
|
| This product would work well for us.
| buescher wrote:
| The third time someone calls to complain that the alkaline
| batteries they put in this leaked, they'll wish they used a
| soldered-in 3V lithium primary cell. Even though that goes
| against a certain ethos.
| tivert wrote:
| > The third time someone calls to complain that the alkaline
| batteries they put in this leaked, they'll wish they used a
| soldered-in 3V lithium primary cell. Even though that goes
| against a certain ethos.
|
| Those aren't alkaline batteries. Energizer makes AA/AAA-size
| lithium primary batteries, which is what they are using. They
| wont leak and have a 25 year shelf life.
|
| https://data.energizer.com/pdfs/l91.pdf
|
| And I don't think _they 'd_ get complaints about alkaline
| batteries leaking. I think pretty much anyone (even those who
| don't understand batteries), would tend to blame the batteries
| themselves, not the device they're in.
| buescher wrote:
| I saw that they recommended Energizer lithiums. So would I.
| Recommendations won't change that behavior, which I am very
| familiar with. It's ok that you aren't if you're willing to
| learn something today.
| wyager wrote:
| He means that idiot customers will use the wrong batteries
| and get mad, and they absolutely will. The modal customer
| doesn't understand anything about battery chemistry and will
| unconditionally buy the cheapest battery at the store.
| buescher wrote:
| No amount of intelligence or understanding of battery
| chemistry will make batteries any less dismal and
| disappointing to the consumer.
|
| Ironically, the very cheapest carbon-zinc batteries
| probably would be kind of OK in this application.
| to11mtm wrote:
| _cries in 'I worked at a computer shop that started selling
| carbon-zinc batteries around 2002-2003'_
| jerlam wrote:
| They should have added $5 to the price and packaged in $4 of
| lithium AA batteries.
| stephenitis wrote:
| I agree, I don't want to have to buy batteries separately,
| bad buyer experience.
| undebuggable wrote:
| The lithium AA/AAA/CR batteries don't seem to leak. They're not
| widely available though. I use them for devices which mostly
| sit in a drawer and their lifetime can reach 5-6 years.
| myself248 wrote:
| They fall from the sky. I don't buy them, I just hit up
| sondehub and see where there's a barely-used pair waiting for
| me to go clean up some litter.
| undebuggable wrote:
| What do you mean, what is sondehub?
| myself248 wrote:
| Tracking weather balloons. They use lithium AAs for
| power, and the mission only uses a fraction of their
| capacity. When the balloon pops and the payload lands,
| there's a good pair of AA's laying in some farmer's
| field, stuck in a tree, or otherwise sitting around
| waiting for you to clean 'em up.
| MikeRichardson wrote:
| Primary lithium batteries absolutely do leak, given enough
| time. Often the victim is an old Mac motherboard, search for
| "mac pram battery ruined motherboard" on an image search
| engine of your choice.
| Grazester wrote:
| Who leaves 10K worth of anything in their car? I get antsy
| leaving my $200 laptop hidden under my seat! This person is
| crazy.
|
| There is also no guarantee they person who stole the bag wouldn't
| dump the bag(with the hidden AirTag) and just keep the gear or
| that the police would help recover it even if you gave them the
| location(many times the don't).
| xattt wrote:
| Usually, cars are worth more than 10K and they are often left
| out in the street!
| Grazester wrote:
| Yeah but someone can't pick up my car and walk away with it
| on their back, can they now, genius?
| withinboredom wrote:
| hulk has entered the chat
| nine_k wrote:
| Cars are impractical to carry by hand, while a lot of
| expensive computer / photo / audio gear can easily be carried
| in a tote bag.
| qazxcvbnmlp wrote:
| The amount of things you leave in your car varies strong by
| local. In many parts of the country you can leave the car
| unlocked w/ laptop inside no problem.
| npretto wrote:
| Surely going to lunch with 10k of equipment is safer,
| especially when you'll need to go to the toilet.
| Vegenoid wrote:
| I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not, but generally
| car break-ins are much more frequent than muggings. And
| bringing a bag of expensive equipment into the bathroom is
| almost certainly less risky than leaving it somewhere,
| whether in your car or elsewhere.
| Grazester wrote:
| It's a backpack. You hang it on the hook on the stall door
| where you hang your jacket
|
| I think there is less of a likelihood someone is going to
| jump you for your backpack when you are at a restaurant for
| lunch than there is for them breaking into a car parked only
| a dimly lit street for said backpack.
| theshrike79 wrote:
| Except that American public toilets have gaps so large
| between the door and the frame that a thief can pretty much
| just grab the backpack without opening the door =)
| Grazester wrote:
| I live in big City America. This is what I did. Hang my
| backpack on the stall hook as stated or shit with it on
| my lap. I carried a laptop, DSLR and lens with me for all
| my college life. I couldn't afford to replace anything if
| lost during said times as an international student whose
| credits cost more than 3 times that of a non-
| international student.
| scottyah wrote:
| Paragliders, though with the small community their resale value
| is pretty low so I'm not sure it's "$10k worth", even if that's
| what it cost.
| grujicd wrote:
| It's not very risky to leave expensive items in the car, but in
| the trunk, not on the backseat! Also, never put these expensive
| items or really any kind of bag in the trunk after you park.
| Always do it before the ride. Or at least make very sure that
| no one is watching you.
|
| This is a basic safety drill. And it doesn't apply to expensive
| things only. You don't want your window broken for a sport bag
| with a sweaty t-shirt used in a gym like it happened to my
| friend. Any kind of bag left visible in a car is a risk.
| wyager wrote:
| > in the trunk, not on the backseat! Also, never put these
| expensive items or really any kind of bag in the trunk after
| you park... You don't want your window broken for a sport bag
|
| A frustrating thing is that it's completely optional to live
| in a society where this is a problem. We know how to stop
| this from happening. There are places where you just don't
| have to live in fear of some low-life breaking your window,
| and we have the technical ability to replicate those
| conditions in any moderately-wealthy country, if we aren't
| prevented from doing so.
| 0xffff2 wrote:
| Can you elaborate? I'm honestly at a loss as to what you're
| suggesting? Is it just that we should have extremely long
| jail sentences and/or executions for petty crimes, or is
| there some other option I'm missing?
| wyager wrote:
| Crime, as with most things, follows a power law
| distribution. Almost all crime is from extremely
| predictable repeat offenders. You could eliminate over
| 80% of crime just by enforcing a 3-strikes policy.
| https://inquisitivebird.xyz/p/when-few-do-great-harm
| canucker2016 wrote:
| ...except when you're still in the car, while driving in San
| Francisco.
|
| Photographer had their camera bag stolen from their car while
| waiting to get on to an on-ramp in San Fran. see
| https://www.ktvu.com/news/real-estate-photographer-robbed-
| of...
| sib wrote:
| I lost > $10K of photo gear from a locked car trunk on my
| first trip to Hawaii (Oahu).
|
| I shot some pictures at a photo location, put the gear, in my
| camera backpack, into the trunk, drove 30 minutes to a
| completely different town, and stopped for lunch.
|
| When I got back to the car, the stuff was gone. Thief had
| jimmied the driver's door and used the remote latch to open
| the trunk.
|
| Surprisingly, my renter's insurance covered the loss without
| a hassle, except for a $500 deductible. But three days of
| pictures that I hadn't yet downloaded were gone forever :(
| fortran77 wrote:
| "How dare that woman wear that sexy dress! She was just asking
| to be raped!"
|
| You are a terrible person.
| wyager wrote:
| > Who leaves 10K worth of anything in their car?
|
| People who live in a high-trust society and not a shithole? I
| leave $10k of stuff in my car all the time, and it would be
| super inconvenient if I couldn't.
| Grazester wrote:
| No matter how trusting I am of society this is something I
| cannot and will not do. It takes one person to commit this
| crime.
|
| It doesn't even have to be a "shit hole", then what? I am out
| of 10k? I only have myself to blame then really because I
| trusted "society".
|
| The world isn't perfect and I am not half naive enough to
| think it is and put my trust in it for anything worth this
| much.
| phil21 wrote:
| In such places folks feel comfortable leaving $10k worth of
| gear in their vehicle, law enforcement would most likely
| follow up if you had the gear tracked to a known location.
| I've seen such happen with the items being recovered and
| the thieves arrested in a matter of hours from the theft
| happening.
|
| In places where leaving $10k of gear in your car is
| considered foolish and the victims are blamed as many are
| used to these days, law enforcement is useless and the
| victim of the theft laughed at as being hopelessly naive.
|
| It's the tale of two worlds really.
| chili6426 wrote:
| I have a AirTag in my car so I can find it when I park in an
| unfamiliar city or an airport parking lot. I'm imagining a
| rechargeable version I could plug into the cigarette lighter and
| it would theoretically last as long as my car does.
| unsnap_biceps wrote:
| I plan on getting one of these TimeCapsules (what a silly name)
| and modify it to be rechargeable.
| kstrauser wrote:
| When I get out of my car, my iPhone remembers that this was the
| last place it was connected to the car's Bluetooth. I don't
| have an special devices or tracker apps or anything else, just
| "Find My" automatically pinning my car's location on the map.
| That's such a neat and helpful feature!
| tonymet wrote:
| this is a great idea and I'd love to see v2 with a 20 year flat-
| pack cell with usb-c charging. It would be 40% smaller and you
| could call it "lifetime charge"
| amluto wrote:
| ISTM that this use case would be better served by building a nice
| piece of openhaystack hardware.
| goryramsy wrote:
| I do wish openhaystack would be updated for MacOS 15, currently
| using a fork from a PR because of changes in MacOS 15's mail
| app.
| rdtsc wrote:
| > My camera bag with $10k of gear was stolen from my car. When I
| saw the broken glass and empty backseat, I immediately pulled up
| FindMy to track the thief ...
|
| Aha, but that's not what AirTags are for, according to Apple at
| least.
|
| On https://www.apple.com/airtag Not a single mention of "theft"
| or "stolen".
|
| It will even politely inform the thief you have a tracker in your
| stuff:
|
| > AirTag is designed to discourage unwanted tracking. If someone
| else's AirTag finds its way into your stuff, the network will
| notice it's traveling with you and send your iPhone an alert
|
| I wouldn't be surprised if Apple will come down on them with
| their legal team for promoting usage of the AirTag that's not
| according to their intended use.
| theshrike79 wrote:
| Just as a thought experiment, what do you think would happen if
| Apple specifically advertised them as theft prevention tools?
| lxgr wrote:
| Presumably people would start complaining that they're really
| bad at that, since they loudly make themselves known to any
| thief.
| rdtsc wrote:
| > what do you think would happen if Apple specifically
| advertised them as theft prevention tools?
|
| I don't know, I am not Apple, and I don't even have AirTags.
| What do you think would happen, it seems you already have an
| idea?
| bufferoverflow wrote:
| I don't see how this huge tracker would help with the stolen
| camera gear. At least an airtag is small enough, you can probably
| glue it to the bottom of the camera, paint it black.
| bee_rider wrote:
| It is huge compared to an AirTag, but as somebody who doesn't
| know much about cameras, if I stole a photographer's stuff and
| something like that was in there, I'd probably not think too
| much about it. It is a black rectangle. Professionals have
| countless black rectangles that I don't understand.
|
| If they wanted to be really clever, they could easily find
| space to disguise it as a usb hard drive or something (I mean
| they could literally stick a USB hard drive in the thing, they
| are so tiny nowadays).
| sllabres wrote:
| I have once used a airtag to track a parcel. This is now 3 years
| ago and despite several low batt warnings since about a year ago
| its still running. So even wit the tiny cell battery the runtime
| can be quite long.
| esaym wrote:
| > we recommend Energizer Ultimate Lithium
|
| The advantage of "lithium" is high rate discharge, not longevity
| right?
| Diti wrote:
| Yep. That recommendation is weird. They should recommend NiMH
| batteries like the Eneloop series from Panasonic.
| cr3ative wrote:
| I think in this case it's shelf life. Very little discharge for
| a very long time.
| esaym wrote:
| Doing some math, looks like a CR2032 is roughly 200mah while
| AA is 2000mah. So if CR2032 lasts one year, then the AA will
| be 10 years, two AA would be 20 years. I guess in that case
| lithium would be the way to go.
|
| I just know for your typical wall clock that takes a single
| AA, whether it is lithium or alkaline, both won't make it
| much further than a year.
| ascorbic wrote:
| These have 3500mAh capacity:
| https://data.energizer.com/pdfs/l91.pdf
| phil21 wrote:
| They don't leak would be why I would choose these over an
| alkaline battery. The draw of an airtag is so low that the
| shelf life becomes very material.
|
| I also put lithium AA/AAA batteries in remotes these days -
| anything that might get stuck in a drawer for years at a time
| and needed again for a random task. My A/V receiver remote is
| rarely touched, but when I need it I really need it. Too many
| times have I went to grab some device like that only to find
| the batteries have leaked and corroded a critical component on
| the PCB.
| ascorbic wrote:
| Those are the same batteries that come with Nest smoke alarms,
| which say they last 10 years. Energizer says they'll last 20
| years in storage. https://energizer.com/batteries/energizer-
| ultimate-lithium-b...
| lxgr wrote:
| Nice! Definitely somewhat of a niche use case, but I don't doubt
| that it exists.
|
| I do wonder though: Do AA batteries actually have a shelf life of
| 10 years even without supplying any current?
| jackvalentine wrote:
| Yes - some quality batteries claim 25 years shelf life.
| Slartie wrote:
| The Lithium ones that they suggest to use do have a decade or
| more of shelf life, and they also don't leak!
|
| I've got an old pinball machine. Those use AA batteries to
| store highscores and settings in a battery-powered RAM chip.
| Typically the batteries must be replaced once a year or at
| least every two years, largely because of self-drain, and it's
| a common occurrence of them leaking, which can quickly destroy
| the 30 year old circuit board they're on. That's why most
| pinball collectors suggest to use Lithium AA batteries: you get
| 5-10 year lifetime, no danger of leakage.
| throwaway2037 wrote:
| Do you know why alkaline batteries leak, but lithium do not?
| daniel_iversen wrote:
| I wonder if the signal strength is worse or not now that the
| AirTag is enclosed in another case? I have my AirTag in the car
| hidden, which already seems to reduce the strength.
| TuringNYC wrote:
| Nice solution, but the bigger problem is how AirTags can
| basically be turned off, which makes it poor for many use cases.
|
| Of course, I get it from Apple's perspective, they dont want
| AirTags to be used to tail others. However, that precludes it
| from being used for theft tracking.
|
| For example, I use an AirTag on my bicycle. If someone steals the
| bicycle, they are literally informed "an air tag is following
| you" https://support.apple.com/en-us/119874
|
| There are a lot of things I'd love to put long-term AirTags on
| (luggage, snow-blower, childrens' backpacks) but if theft isnt
| really deterred, then the case for a bulkier AirTag is quite
| reduced.
| unsupp0rted wrote:
| Theft-tracking is sort of an "off-label" use for AirTags, from
| Apple's perspective.
|
| They'd rather make AirTags less generally useful than make them
| both more generally useful + open to stalking occurrences and
| lawsuits.
| TuringNYC wrote:
| Agreed on the trade-off. And there are some absolutely 1000%
| winning use cases (lost cats, lost dogs, lost luggage).
| However, lets look at the constraints and outcomes:
|
| - Me or other people need to be around (since airtags jump
| off others' devices)
|
| This removes use cases like tracking lost marine goods,
| tracking lost drones, etc.
|
| - Item being tracked has to be big enough to be worth the
| extra size/weight of the long life battery wrapper
|
| This removes most common use cases like wallets, remotes,
| etc.
|
| - Item being tracked has to be something you actually lose
| w/o wrongdoing. Makes sense for backpacks, purses, parked
| cars.
|
| But, most capital equipment wouldnt be "lost" it would be
| stolen, so that is out.
|
| https://ios.gadgethacks.com/how-to/20-surprisingly-
| practical...
| theultdev wrote:
| > This removes most common use cases like wallets, remotes,
| etc.
|
| I use an airtag for my wallet and apple remote.
|
| https://ridge.com/products/carbon-case-for-airtag
|
| https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B09G4PT3NJ
| Diti wrote:
| For 10 USD more than the carbon case, I prefer using the
| following item for my wallet.
| https://nomadgoods.com/products/tracking-card
| theultdev wrote:
| My wallet is rfid blocking, that wouldn't work.
|
| Plus one less card space in it, even if it did work.
| TuringNYC wrote:
| Were talking about the extended battery case, are you
| saying you put this giant thing in your wallet and on
| your remotes?!
| https://www.elevationlab.com/blogs/news/introducing-
| timecaps...
| theultdev wrote:
| Yes, I clearly linked containers that aren't the device
| in question. I don't see the need for the extended
| battery case in those use-cases.
|
| I also don't see my cat wearing that thing either. Maybe
| a large dog.
|
| But things like wallets, remotes, cats, dogs, are usually
| in your possession frequently and only lost for short
| periods of time before you notice.
|
| Luggage would be a good use case, and possibly bikes and
| other large equipment. But I would opt for something more
| discreet vs a larger battery.
| yonatan8070 wrote:
| I don't understand why AirTags being used for stalking would
| open Apple to lawsuits. If I buy a hammer and use it to
| attack someone, the manufacturer of the hammer isn't open to
| a lawsuit.
|
| Of course I'm not saying Apple shouldn't try to protect
| people from stalkers using their control over their products,
| I just don't see why it would make Appld responsible if
| someone misused their products.
| TuringNYC wrote:
| IANAL but the hammer doesnt include an ongoing service, but
| the AirTag is facilitated with a constant service from the
| manufacturer.
| unsupp0rted wrote:
| Also AirTags are meant for tracking personal possessions.
| Hammers aren't meant for murder. Murder is an off-label
| use of hammers.
|
| If AirTags stopped notifying users they're being tracked,
| then AirTags would also be meant for tracking people.
| franga2000 wrote:
| > If AirTags stopped notifying users they're being
| tracked, then AirTags would also be meant for tracking
| people.
|
| What?? That's like by not including a sound device that
| screams "look out, you're being murdered!" on every
| hammer when it's swung, manufacturers are saying their
| hammers are also intended for murder.
|
| Now that Apple has this feature, sure, removing it might
| raise some eyebrows, but the theft tracking use-case is
| so obvious and useful that no judge would ever believe
| that Apple did this specifically to enable stalking.
| 0xffff2 wrote:
| Conversely, people have been suing gun manufacturers after
| shootings basically forever.
| jjeaff wrote:
| Ya, but those cases have tended to get a bit more
| traction because the primary purpose of firearms is to
| kill and there are lots of things that gun makers could
| do to make it more difficult to kill people with them
| (like built in locking mechanisms). A little different
| than say, a hammer, which is not meant as a weapon of
| death.
| wyager wrote:
| Gun manufacturers could add pointless and customer-
| hostile complications to guns just like apple can add
| customer-hostile complications to airtags. The case
| against Apple is even stronger, because at least apple's
| complications have a chance of doing something useful,
| and Apple provides an ongoing service where firearm
| manufacturers do not.
|
| There's also no reasonable standard by which you can
| claim guns are being made to murder people but AirTags
| are not being made to stalk people. A vanishingly small
| fraction of total sales ever goes towards either of these
| undesirable use cases.
|
| The smart move here is to get your risk models in order
| and stop worrying about either of these things.
| giarc wrote:
| I bet it's less about lawsuits and more about reputational
| harm if every week there is a news story about a murder
| facilitated by an AirTag.
| dervjd wrote:
| Any tracker can be turned off if a thief manages to find it -
| but yeah a notification letting them know they need to look
| isn't great.
|
| I use an AirTag on my e-bike - there's quite a few hidden
| mounts out there that look like normal rear reflectors or slot
| in between a water bottle cage and the bike frame. It's also
| trivially easy to pop the AirTag open and remove the speaker so
| it can't beep.
|
| I bought my AirTags before there were any compatible third
| party options, but the non-Apple AirTags don't have the UWB
| chip inside and don't support the precision finding feature
| which would also make them more difficult to find.
| nielsbot wrote:
| It's not just the beeping. The potential thief's iPhone will
| also notify them they're being tracked.
| MikeRichardson wrote:
| I wonder a 3rd party tracker (using Find My network) could
| fool the iPhone somehow. Maybe if it does 1 minute on, 1
| minute off, or something like that?
| csomar wrote:
| > Nice solution, but the bigger problem is how AirTags can
| basically be turned off, which makes it poor for many use
| cases.
|
| Isn't that too late? If you disabled that AirTag with your
| phone, you _are_ probably the thief. Now we got you fully
| I.D.ed.
|
| It seems that the safest bet, for a thief/criminal, is to _not_
| take any iPhone (or phone) on him while committing the crime.
| TuringNYC wrote:
| Thanks for this - I never thought that the act of disabling
| would create a record, but that makes sense! I wonder if that
| is something law enforcement can track and act on.
| electroly wrote:
| There is no feature that allows the thief to disable the
| AirTag at all. In the notification for "an AirTag is
| following you" the link for disabling the AirTag is simply
| instructions for removing the battery. It's up to the thief
| to find the AirTag using the audio ping (which, as
| mentioned elsewhere, you can deactivate by disconnecting
| the speaker) and their human eyeballs.
|
| Go back to the page you linked --
| https://support.apple.com/en-us/119874 -- the bottom of
| this page has a screenshot of those instructions.
| l8rlump wrote:
| https://github.com/seemoo-lab/openhaystack/?tab=readme-ov-fi...
|
| These won't inform, I believe.
| eek2121 wrote:
| They aren't meant for finding stolen stuff, rather, lost stuff.
|
| Also, thieves are dumb.
| ValentineC wrote:
| > _Nice solution, but the bigger problem is how AirTags can
| basically be turned off, which makes it poor for many use
| cases._
|
| > _Of course, I get it from Apple 's perspective, they dont
| want AirTags to be used to tail others._
|
| I'm also not a fan of having to go back to Apple and pay a fee
| for "battery service", when the current fix is a CR2032 battery
| that's under $1.
| running101 wrote:
| Maybe just set a reminder in your phone annually to replace all
| AirTag batteries
| jaykoronivo wrote:
| what a joke.
| jaykoronivo wrote:
| AirLuggages!
| amelius wrote:
| Why can't the AirTag simply report its battery status and warn
| the user e.g. through a nearby iPhone?
|
| This is another case of bad UX by a company praised for its great
| "product design skills".
| devmor wrote:
| It does do that already. The author likely ignored the
| notifications repeatedly until it died.
| lp251 wrote:
| it does
| joefitzgerald wrote:
| > Why can't the AirTag simply report its battery status and
| warn the user e.g. through a nearby iPhone?
|
| This is precisely how an AirTag works. It reports its battery
| status[1] via a notification to the user on an iPhone.
|
| [1]: https://support.apple.com/en-us/102600
| jcrawfordor wrote:
| The size and cost of this unit and the AirTag to put in it get
| close, but not quite to, the size and cost of a cellular asset
| tracker. Roughly $30 more to get into a reputable brand asset
| tracker.
|
| The promised ten-year life is better than the e.g. 4-year life
| you can get out of a GPS/LTE NB-IOT with lithium primary cell and
| deep sleep, and with fewer compromises around tesponsiveness to
| commands (primary-battery asset trackers are usually waking up
| like once every 6 hours). Still, standalone asset trackers have a
| number of features that make them more suitable for theft
| scenarios than airtags, not least of which is the absence of the
| anti-stalking feature of airtags which means they're never really
| a concealable option.
|
| The major difference left is consumer-friendliness... Most asset
| trackers are provided by vendors with pretty hefty ongoing fees,
| and more oriented towards commercial customers like fleet
| operators and construction. Big difference in ease of purchase
| and use. It does make you wonder about the market for a really
| consumer-friendly solution, though.
| myself248 wrote:
| What's the cheapest monthly fee I can get on an asset tracker
| with some confidence that it'll still be operating in 4 years
| when the batteries run out?
| nycdatasci wrote:
| Get all perils insurance and make sure your typical use is
| covered. Often, commercial use will not be covered so it's
| important to double-check!
| cheema33 wrote:
| Insurance requires making constant regular payments to a third
| party for life. I self-insure most things.
|
| Also, have you ever made an insurance claim? I have. A claim is
| really bad for your insurance rates with most insurance
| companies.
| EugeneOZ wrote:
| The last line could be a real link :)
| enigma101 wrote:
| the battery will erode on the contact springs way before 10 years
| tho. just sayin. Sorry to hear about your stolen gear
| samanthasu wrote:
| If the battery can work so long, I'd love to use it for my quartz
| watch!!
| fauria wrote:
| It is not a new cell battery, is an enclosure with 2 AA lithium
| batteries that replaces the standard CR2032.
| elintknower wrote:
| Incredibly cool and stupid simple. Just purchased 10 of them!
| varenc wrote:
| If you could disable the public key rotation on the AirTag,
| presumably you could greatly extend its battery life at the cost
| of your own privacy. When your battery gets low, Apple warns that
| "privacy protection is temporarily adjusted, AirTag may be
| traceable over Bluetooth". Wish I could enable this behavior in
| certain situations to extend the life.
|
| (Or hook up an oversized external battery like this one, but tune
| the voltage to ~2V so it always looks like a nearly depleted
| CR2032 battery!)
| fellerts wrote:
| I doubt that key rotation is a significant contributor to
| energy use. Energy spent doing RF (transmitting) plus energy
| spent sleeping will account for over 90 % of the energy use.
|
| Source: I'm in a similar industry
| generalizations wrote:
| I think the airtag just wakes up less frequently on low
| power, so it has fewer opportunities to rotate the key.
| gcanyon wrote:
| I know the concept here is set it and forget it, but still:
| wouldn't it make more sense to have a smaller (but still probably
| larger than the current setup) rechargeable battery? I admit I
| haven't done any research on this, but the Magic Mouse/Keyboard
| seem to prove the concept of a rechargeable battery lasting
| months at least, and the Apple Watch proves the idea of wireless
| charging in a compact form factor, so it seems likely you could
| produce something that 1. Still roughly fits the AirTag physical
| profile (i.e. could be used as a dog tag, which this certainly
| could not) and lasts for months at least and is easily
| rechargeable. And again, I get that I'm making it require _more_
| maintenance rather than (effectively) zero maintenance with this
| product, but the wireless recharging makes that maintenance much
| less of a burden than sourcing and swapping a watch battery.
| brookst wrote:
| Months would be painful. I have six airtags, so at two years
| life I'm replacing a battery every 4 months. If the lifespan
| was 3 months, I would be recharging one every two weeks. That
| means pulling them out of (relatively) hidden spots on a car
| and scooter, a laptop bag that I don't even use most months,
| etc. For me, it would mean most of them were dead most of the
| time.
| gcanyon wrote:
| Oh, 100% if you're burying one in an obscure place on your
| car, you want to set it and forget it, and you have the
| space, so the 10-year battery makes sense. I'm thinking of
| the more portable use cases.
| nevi-me wrote:
| I imagine that keeping the cost down might have been important
| when designing this. You don't need a rechargeable battery and
| the charging circuitry.
|
| 10 years is also long enough that perhaps the tracker might
| stop being supported before its battery runs out.
| noja wrote:
| I think this is a sleeper ad for the new AirTag, and that it will
| have a ten year battery life.
| radres wrote:
| Good god. Do you see how good things happen when you let people
| change their fucking batteries?
| undebuggable wrote:
| I'm genuinely surprised that Apple product has a replaceable
| battery at all.
| nielsbot wrote:
| Do you mean "user-replaceable"? You can get new batteries for
| most Apple products (I think). Exception is AirPods (Pro).
| undebuggable wrote:
| I just watched a video with the battery replacement in
| Macbook Air. There is no way the laptop will switch on after
| I do it by myself for the first time.
| simonjgreen wrote:
| A browse through this companies product selection is interesting.
| They make some really well thought through options for mounting
| and attaching AirTags that I've not seen elsewhere. In particular
| the pin, bike tube, and fabric mount ones.
|
| The CNC screws mentioned in other thread appear to be part of
| their design language btw.
| spike021 wrote:
| They've been around quite a while now and have always seemed to
| have sturdy looking designs.
| AkashKaStudio wrote:
| Yeah, I wanted to see all the products at a glance without
| having to click & open each one of them.
| asynchronous wrote:
| I have several of their fabric mounts, one for a backpack and
| another for a dog collar, they're more expensive than the cheap
| knockoffs but the quality is top notch and they're worth every
| penny.
| satonakamoto wrote:
| My $2 version:
| https://img.alicdn.com/bao/uploaded/i3/278427340/O1CN01LBluO...
| https://img.alicdn.com/bao/uploaded/i3/278427340/O1CN01qLKoY...
| https://img.alicdn.com/imgextra/i4/4611686018427384736/O1CN0...
| https://img.alicdn.com/imgextra/i1/4611686018427381970/O1CN0...
| mati365 wrote:
| That white clock looks cool. What's the name?
| madchinchilla wrote:
| Looks like Xiaomi Mi Temperature and Humidity Monitor Pro.
| tecleandor wrote:
| Just in case you're looking for the exact model, it's:
| LYWSD02MMC
| jjeaff wrote:
| I have a dozen of those style temperature gauges all over my
| house. Mine are actually a slightly smaller, square version.
| You can use Home Assistant to read the Bluetooth temperature
| and humidity readings from them. They ended up costing maybe
| $3 each when buying several at a time. Battery tends to last
| a bit over a year.
| ra120271 wrote:
| is that a purchasable product? link? Thank you in advance!
| rahimnathwani wrote:
| The airtag case doesn't have a gap large enough to allow a
| regular wire to pass through. I guess you'd need to drill the
| cover, or just discard the cover and use tape. Then you could
| use one of these dummy batteries:
|
| https://www.aliexpress.us/w/wholesale-cr2032-dummy.html
| piyuv wrote:
| If you're the type of person who forgets to change a battery
| every year, in spite of Find My app warning you a couple of
| times, most likely you'll forget to change it in a decade too
| adamm255 wrote:
| Yeah I've not forgotten yet, the warnings were pretty
| impressive. Key is to have a few replacements on hand so you
| dont have to remember to buy them.
| phoronixrly wrote:
| Don't worry, the AA cells will deteriorate far before the 10
| years necessary to deplete their charge.
| myself248 wrote:
| That's why it's shown with Energizer Lithium primary cells.
| No they won't.
| harvie wrote:
| This is cool, but i can see simple improvement. You're supposed
| to discard airtag backplate, but the capsule is big enough to
| provide compartment for storing it. Just in case that you decide
| to re-use that airtag in some other way in upcomming 10 years...
| I think that would be neat addition.
| dgroshev wrote:
| I'm almost sure they are 3D printed on a nylon SLS machine, what
| a lovely example of high quality printing enabling relatively
| small scale, high number of SKU production!
| billylo wrote:
| A 3D-printed part + two washers + battery case. DIY approach.
| https://www.printables.com/model/383741-cr2032-battery-adapt...
| q3k wrote:
| My $0 version:
|
| https://object.ceph-eu.hswaw.net/q3k-personal/5143b5491fca11...
|
| Usually wrapped in electrician's tape.
|
| 1. NRF52 board from some scrap given by a friend, running
| forked/ported OpenHaystack firmware
|
| 2. AA battery holder from junk box
|
| 3. AA batteries from junk drawer
|
| If my math is correct, this should last until AA self-discharge,
| ie. around 10 years. Yes, it works with Apple's FindMy network.
| Yes, I've flown with it.
| stanmancan wrote:
| I guess anything could be a $0 version if you just happen to
| have all the parts already.
| OceanBreeze77 wrote:
| how long do batteries in watches last for?
| wkyleg wrote:
| Something like air tags would be a great use case for an open
| source DePin project. Ideally Zero Knowledge proofs would be used
| to preserve privacy.
| websku wrote:
| there you go. It's useful, but you can find cheaper alternatives
| easily on chinese websites.
| lowbloodsugar wrote:
| Don't AA batteries leak long before 10 years?
| neuroelectron wrote:
| This addresses the main reason why I haven't bought an AirTag
| yet.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2024-12-21 18:01 UTC)