[HN Gopher] Apple introduces new AirTag with longer range and im...
___________________________________________________________________
Apple introduces new AirTag with longer range and improved
findability
Author : meetpateltech
Score : 197 points
Date : 2026-01-26 14:10 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.apple.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.apple.com)
| slimadvies wrote:
| That took a long time. Better late than never.
| mikestew wrote:
| Late? When did Apple originally announce that it would be
| released?
| candiddevmike wrote:
| I hate that this eventual e-waste wasn't standardized across
| vendors. It makes perfect sense for every phone to be a potential
| node, but the network is bifurcated (and possibly more
| bifurcations within Android due to Google's privacy-first
| approach...).
| _verandaguy wrote:
| Maybe a hot take, but I don't think this is as awful for
| e-waste as many other things.
|
| I've had a set of airtags for a good few years now (shortly
| before Covid, I think?) and they mostly just kinda work. They
| don't insist upon a need to upgrade, the only part that ever
| goes bad is the battery -- which is a standard, user-
| replaceable CR2032, and while batteries going into the garbage
| isn't fantastic, there's really only so much you can do as long
| as depend on them.
|
| Like -- this announcement is technically an upgrade, but I've
| never been less tempted to actually buy into it because the
| existing product does what it does plenty well enough for my
| needs.
|
| I do think it's a bit funny to highlight anything Google does
| now as privacy-first, though. I can't play back Youtube embeds
| in Waterfox because the browser's default privacy-preserving
| setting doesn't send referrer information to those embeds,
| which Youtube now requires for embeds to work. As much as I
| take issue with Apple's politics over the past year, they do
| tend to lean towards on-device logic where possible, and their
| work in the homomorphic cryptography niche has been interesting
| to follow.
| retired wrote:
| Please don't put your CR2032 in the garbage. Use battery
| disposal points for that.
| _verandaguy wrote:
| I use the terms interchangeably when it comes to batteries;
| I do use battery disposal bins, but I don't have any faith
| that the actual process behind the scenes is much less
| impactful for the environment.
|
| It's like when I learned that many paper recycling programs
| end up combining paper with regular garbage, or finding out
| that plastic recycling is comically ineffective in its
| outcomes.
| retired wrote:
| Batteries in the trash are also a fire hazard. It's not
| just for the environment.
| verdverm wrote:
| Are they less prone to stalking? All I see is generic corpo
| "industry security" verbiage
| ndr wrote:
| The most stalkable users are android users, but even that it's
| going away with newer androids. And it already beeps when you
| move it if it's been away from the owner for too long.
|
| I know because I have an android phone and a not-so-used ipad
| and mine beep all the time.
|
| What stalking scenario are you worried with?
| verdverm wrote:
| Have you not seen the stories? Put one of these on the
| underside of an ex's car
| simonw wrote:
| How does that avoid the Android/iPhone unknown AirTag
| warning features?
| buzzerbetrayed wrote:
| And it would notify your ex that you did so, no?
|
| Apple has already done more than enough to discourage
| stalking. We shouldn't nerf all our technology to the
| ground because assholes exist.
| numpad0 wrote:
| It's too late when they are notified. The last known
| address is where the victim is at.
| kube-system wrote:
| The perpetrator has to already find the victim, and
| physically be there, to put the tag on the car
| PurpleRamen wrote:
| Meeting could happen in public, it doesn't mean they know
| their private address.
|
| For example, meet someone at a convention/fair/job,
| gift/sell them something which has a hidden tag, and then
| wait for them to drive to their hotel, or home. Gotcha.
| With influencer and celebs, you can also send something
| to their agency, and hope they are re-routed to their
| home. S** like that happened quite often until people
| learned to be more careful. Probably still sometimes
| happens even now.
| kube-system wrote:
| I'm sure idiots do this but it's a pretty high risk way
| to try to track someone. IME the tracking notifications
| are timely enough that you're going to have a good idea
| where they came from. _Actual_ GPS trackers are cheap on
| Amazon, have better accuracy, and don 't notify people
| they exist -- they just don't have the public's mindshare
| nearly as much.
| numpad0 wrote:
| On the car, not on the car at the victim's house.
|
| Or the much more, frankly _common_ , scenario is: a $15
| plushie bought through Amazon wishlist, sold by PerpOwned
| LLC for $500, and delivered through Amazon warehouse.
| That's actually happening.
| kube-system wrote:
| I don't know why anyone with a budget would choose to use
| an Airtag that notifies nearby iPhones and makes noise
| when you move it around. If Amazon lets you ship
| arbitrary items to people's private address, that sounds
| like a vulnerability with Amazon that is far more severe
| than simply shipping Airtags.
| copperx wrote:
| Isn't it easy to disable the speaker?
| kstrauser wrote:
| "Easy" in relative terms for people who hack on
| electronics. Even if you remove the speaker, modern phones
| will tell the victim that someone else's AirTag is moving
| along with them, unless the owner of the AirTag is also
| present.
| klinquist wrote:
| There were rumors that this version makes the speaker harder to
| remove (I remove the speaker from the previous version when I
| put them in my own cars & motorcycles to make them harder to
| find). Looking forward to a teardown...
| simonw wrote:
| It looks like the anti-stalking mechanism remains the same: if
| your iPhone detects that a non-paired AirTag is traveling with
| you you'll get a persistent notification about it.
|
| I've seen these myself for my partner's AirTag when I was
| carrying her stuff.
|
| Apparently Android 6+ can warn you about AirTags in the same
| way, since May 2024:
| https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2024/05/apple-and-google-deli...
| raudette wrote:
| The way Find My has been built, it doesn't really matter what
| they do with the tags, it's fairly straightforward to build
| your own tags, or modify tags, that bypass any stalking
| detection.
|
| A phone's stalking detection just looks for a tag that's not
| yours that has been around you for a while.
|
| But you can modify a tag such that it selectively powers up, or
| build a tag that changes identifiers, such that the stalking
| detection tools don't pick it up.
|
| I've written a bit about this here:
| https://www.hotelexistence.ca/further-thoughts-on-stealth-ai...
| https://www.hotelexistence.ca/exploring-bluetooth-trackers-a...
| FigurativeVoid wrote:
| Probably one of the best products apple has made of late:
| relatively affordable, good ux, user replaceable batteries. Glad
| to see this iteration hasn't made it worse.
| prodigycorp wrote:
| Apple of late is a mystery. Their software and hardware product
| quality is wildly inconsistent and, yet, with the most simplest
| of hardware like AirTags and AirPods, they're like magic.
| iPhones, I could hardly care less about. These new airtags?
| Insta buy!
| throwfaraway4 wrote:
| I'm not convinced AirPods are that "simple"
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PB_8dGKh9JI
| prodigycorp wrote:
| Or their chargers!
| https://www.chargerlab.com/apple-18w-usb-c-power-
| adapter-a16...
| fragmede wrote:
| Airpods are a great example of good UX making things _seem_
| simple. There 's a ridiculous amount of engineering that
| goes into making them work as well as they do.
| m463 wrote:
| yes, apple has a LOT of hidden complexity. Another example
| is their dongles - many of them have significant processing
| power, like video conversion chips inside the shell.
| emchammer wrote:
| Apple's headphones adapter contains very high quality
| output and driver hardware. Their basic software
| usability quality problems simply shortchange everyone
| involved.
| dlcarrier wrote:
| The quality would be better if those weren't needed,
| though.
| FigurativeVoid wrote:
| I've started to dislike the narrative that "Apple never leads
| the pack, but it waits to release the best product."
|
| But that hasn't been true for a decade. Most improvements
| have been marginal, and they totally missed the boat on LLMs.
| no_wizard wrote:
| To be fair, I think everyone but Google has been missing
| the boat on LLMs as platform integrations.
|
| I call out Google as an exception because Gemini when it
| works correctly from an integration point of view can
| actually do some cool stuff like predictive suggestions in
| messaging based on context, though I wish it was all on
| device stuff, as on a privacy level I don't trust Google
|
| That said, it's not like they're so far and above anyone
| else they blow the competition out of the water either,
| they simply managed to make the functionality sometimes
| useful
| postexitus wrote:
| Why should Apple care about LLMs? They missed the boat on
| cloud, cryptocurrencies and on search engines. So what?
| It's not their business - they can just license a good
| offering and move on to what they do best : Products.
| AdamN wrote:
| LLMs are way outside their lane. With that said they've
| been focused on the underlying components to enable LLMs
| since way before ChatGPT was on the scene: Unified Memory,
| Neural Accelerator, even Spotlight counts (as a data
| source), etc...
|
| There was no world where they were going to be the
| breakthrough leader in LLM development. That's a problem
| they can catch up on when they need to or license the
| technology.
| kwanbix wrote:
| I can see it in AirTags, but, haven't used AirPods myself,
| what is so "magical" about them?
|
| Also, my understanding is that AirTags are only usable if you
| have an iPhone, am I wrong?
| criddell wrote:
| I've used them with my iPad. I don't have a Mac, but I
| would guess they work with any Find My-capable machine.
| singularity2001 wrote:
| That just work. I know it sounds simple but if you have
| been burned by Bluetooth devices before again and again get
| unburned by AirPods. Also, they stick in my ear even though
| all other headsets with cable fell out. I don't know how
| kwanbix wrote:
| Maybe I got lucky, but I never had issues with my Bose,
| Shokz, or even with my Soundcore headphones and
| bluetooth. I don't use in ear, so I can not comment on
| that.
| tuetuopay wrote:
| From what I've read, it's an accumulation of small
| details.
|
| I have a pair of Soundcore buds, and they work well.
| Unless only one of the two decides to not connect to the
| phone. Or they randomly decide to change the noise
| cancellation setting. Or their gesture detection randomly
| triggers. To be fair, it's pretty rare and easy to fix:
| put them back in the case and back out, etc. But it's
| small things that remind me "yeah, I did not shell out
| for AirPods". (also, their transparency mode for
| conversations is nigh useless, but it may be because
| those are a 4 year old model).
|
| I regularily use a pair of Sony headphones too, and they
| are a bit less troublesome, because it's a much simpler
| product: a single BT connection, physical buttons for
| some quick controls, etc. But they still have their
| warts: can't charge and be used at the same time, handoff
| between two source devices still don't work after years,
| etc.
|
| It's an accumulation of details that are not big, happen
| rarely, and don't need much to get used to. But they
| still need to get used to.
| pjerem wrote:
| Yep but with AirPods, you are listening music or watching
| a video, on your Mac, your iPhone rings (on your
| AirPods), you accept the call, and now the video is
| paused on your Mac and your AirPods are already connected
| to your iPhone.
|
| Any time any of the registered devices needs to emit
| sound, the AirPods instantly switch to this device (and
| both devices will show an unobtrusive notification to
| reverse the auto switch).
|
| And it works every. single. time.
|
| Apple can't make Airdrop work reliably after decades but
| somehow, they are able to magically and instantly
| transfer bluetooth audio from a device to another device.
|
| Though, if you use your airpods with anything non apple,
| it will juste work like a classical bluetooth device,
| with manual pairing and no magic switching.
| fragmede wrote:
| That is a great point. Airdrop on my iphone currently has
| this weird bug where if I try and airdrop directly to a
| target (eg my laptop) it doesn't work, but if I go into
| airdrop and select the exact same target, works fine.
| This is even weirder because it's followed me between
| phones (I restored from icloud backup). Yet, yeah, my
| airpods are fine at switching.
| toast0 wrote:
| AirPods are great! You can use them with an Android, and it
| will let you know there's AirPods travelling with you every
| time!
| user34283 wrote:
| That is correct. With the iPhone at home, you keep getting
| "Unknown tracker found travelling with you" spam on your
| Android, and the AirTag rings occasionally.
|
| I would not call that usable.
| otterley wrote:
| Apple is a big company. I'd be more surprised if they were
| completely consistent.
| tacker2000 wrote:
| How are Airtags or Airpods simple?
|
| Cramming lots of tech into a small footprint is an extremely
| complex affair.
| dangus wrote:
| Simple user experience.
| ehsankia wrote:
| > relatively affordable
|
| You can buy 4 third-party trackers for the price of 1 official
| one.
|
| They do lack UWB, though there are other great form factors
| such as cards, and cool features such as wireless charging or
| usb-c charging, which imo is nicer than swapping batteries
| every few months.
| darknavi wrote:
| Do they plug into the Find My network that iOS devices use?
| ehsankia wrote:
| Yep, Tile I believe is the only third party service that
| exists. All other trackers either plug into "Apple Find My"
| or "Android Find My Device" network. There's finally
| starting to be a few devices that can do both, but they're
| rare, so make sure you get the right one when buying. But
| they take 10s to setup and it's very smooth.
| skiman10 wrote:
| Samsung trackers also use their own network.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| Tiles are about the same price as AirTags (at least they
| were last time I bought some)
| haneefmubarak wrote:
| Any names or recs on the ones that can do both? Can they
| do both simultaneously?
| igama wrote:
| Yes
| port11 wrote:
| I have a third-party tracker and the AirTag in my bicycle.
| The third-party tracker has no clue what it's doing or meant
| to do. But then again, the AirTag is completely inaudible in
| a decently-sized bicycle parking garage.
| logicalfails wrote:
| > The new AirTag is designed with the environment in mind, with
| 85 percent recycled plastic in the enclosure, 100 percent
| recycled rare earth elements in all magnets, and 100 percent
| recycled gold plating in all Apple-designed printed circuit
| boards. The paper packaging is 100 percent fiber-based and can be
| easily recycled.
|
| I'm no material scientist, but this seems pretty impressive to me
| that Apple's economy of scale can pull this off, and upgrade the
| device capabilities, for less than $30 USD.
| jsheard wrote:
| Building an attachment point into the tag itself is still
| beyond current technology though. We just don't know how to do
| it.
| 542458 wrote:
| Different people want different attachment types (or no
| attachment point at all), so it makes sense for that to be
| external. I've used other trackers with integrated attachment
| points, and because the attachment point has to be very
| compact it tends to be flimsy or hard to fit.. vs the Apple
| one where you can add a larger attachment point that makes
| sense to you.
| peddling-brink wrote:
| Are you trying to say that the AirTag is so strictly
| utilitarian, that they couldn't have found a spot for a
| lanyard hole?
|
| I disagree, they could have, they didn't want to. Beyond
| the look, this sure panders to their accessory partners.
|
| How big of an industry is the phone case? Should it even
| exist? The audacity.
| wang_li wrote:
| Somebody take an x-ray so where know where to drill our
| own holes.
| dylan604 wrote:
| Already been done
|
| https://appleinsider.com/articles/21/05/02/x-rays-show-
| how-a...
| xattt wrote:
| > For the initial disassembly, the AirTag is said to be
| the hardest to open to access the battery. Though all
| three could be opened by hand, the AirTag is suggested to
| be the hardest due to the lack of divots for grip.
|
| Does the author lack thumbs? It's easy to twist the
| battery open.
| CamJN wrote:
| The lack of a divot prevents iFixit from selling an
| overpriced single use tool that exactly matches the divot
| shape for $50 USD that just so happens to be the exact
| same shape and material as a $0.05 guitar pick. Totally
| unacceptable, won't anyone think of the
| environment?!?!?!?!
| wat10000 wrote:
| Yes, the phone case industry should exist. People want
| different things. Plenty of people are willing to go
| without a case entirely. For those who want a case, they
| want different tradeoffs between bulk and protection.
| They want different textures. It's OK to sell something
| that isn't all things to all people.
| myself248 wrote:
| Right? Nokias had the equivalent of today's "case" built
| right into the design of the unit, plenty of durable
| plastic around the vulnerable parts -- the phone would've
| been considered unfit for sale if it couldn't survive a
| drop in out-of-the-box condition.
|
| By the time you stripped a dumbphone down to be as
| vulnerable as one of today's is, it'd be a bare PCB. Nah,
| probably even in that state, I bet it could handle a drop
| better than a new iPhone straight out of the box.
|
| What you buy today isn't a complete phone, it's just the
| guts. One tumble to pavement and you're out a grand.
| Heaven help you if you fumble it while trying to install
| the case that should've been part of it from the
| beginning.
|
| And yet, we still buy them, because the alternatives are
| from shady manufacturers who never provide updates, and
| there is no third-party hardware that can run up-to-date
| iOS. If there was, I'd buy an iNokia in a heartbeat.
| arghwhat wrote:
| There are third-party tags out there compatible with both
| Google and Apple's network that is roughly the same size
| and use the same battery, yet have a _giant_ lanyard
| opening in the design to fit anything.
|
| Apple could trivially have fit a usable hole if they wanted
| to. They just don't want to because they get to sell
| accessories with that now. Also, looking cleaner on its own
| helps sell even if that is an entirely useless quality for
| a tag tha tneeds to go into a bloody case.
| ishtanbul wrote:
| this is the smallest attachment loop i've found. It's rock
| solid https://www.amazon.com/dp/B09CPTS8JG?ref_=ppx_hzsearch_
| conn_...
| Brajeshwar wrote:
| I use quite a few varieties, including Apple's, and I have
| found Belkin's to be an ideal one -- small, secure, with a
| minimal footprint, and available with a keyring or a
| lanyard.
|
| https://www.belkin.com/p/secure-holder-with-key-ring-for-
| air...
| traceroute66 wrote:
| Dude... not cool to put your Amazon `ref` link in there....
| nathancahill wrote:
| It's not theirs, internal Amazon stuff. Also, plug for
| Firefox and the Copy Clean Link function.
| jsheard wrote:
| Yeah &ref= is for analytics, affiliate referrals use
| &tag=.
| fragmede wrote:
| But I got my pitchfork out and everything! How _dare_
| someone try and make money to pay their bills!
| pftburger wrote:
| The fundamental issue preventing keyring aperture integration
| stems from the AirTag's reliance on inverse-phase magnetic
| reluctance in the structural substrate. You see, the
| enclosure maintains a precisely calibrated coefficient
| offramular expansion. Introducing a penetrative void would
| destabilize the sinusoidal depleneration required for proper
| UWB phase conjugation. The resulting spurving bearing
| misalignment could induce up to 40 millidarkness of signal
| attenuation. Apple's engineers attempted to compensate using
| prefabulated amulite in the magneto-reluctance housing, but
| this only exacerbated the side-fumbling in the hyperboloid
| waveform generators. Early prototypes with keyring holes
| exhibited catastrophic unilateral dingle-arm failure within
| mere minutes of deployment. Until we develop lotus-o-delta-
| type bearings capable of withstanding the differential girdle
| spring modulation, I'm afraid keyring integration remains
| firmly in the realm of theoretical engineering--right up
| there with perpetual motion machines and TypeScript projects
| that compile without any // @ts-ignore comments. The
| technology simply isn't there yet.
| next_xibalba wrote:
| > attempted to compensate using prefabulated amulite in the
| magneto-reluctance housing, but this only exacerbated the
| side-fumbling in the hyperboloid waveform generators
|
| Wrote my PhD dissertation on this. It would've been in the
| literature for Apple's engineers to find, but unfortunately
| I lost institutional support to get this into a journal
| after my college (Mailorderdegrees.com, an FTX
| University^TM) folded mid-process.
| kstrauser wrote:
| You really don't want to accidentally frobnicate the turbo
| encabulator.
| nasretdinov wrote:
| I must say you had me in the first couple sentences :).
| Also does look like it's not an LLM-generated text either.
| Good job!
| nerdsniper wrote:
| Indeed, LLM's still suck at the cultural nuance required
| for humor. It's like they're writing for an audience
| that's too generic, so the joke doesn't truly "land" for
| anyone in particular.
| glitchc wrote:
| You missed the "strategic use of metamaterials to emanate a
| negative refractive index"
| m463 wrote:
| rumors are the airtag promax has it for $99.
| dmd wrote:
| Sadly the polishing cloth doesn't work on that one
| port11 wrote:
| Of course the offramular expansion is what makes all the
| Fleeb Juice a key aspect of Find My. That and the lack of a
| substantive in the name.
| wmeredith wrote:
| I think the point is to make the smallest unit of
| functionality possible and then people can integrate that
| into their use case using attachments, casings, etc. in a way
| they see fit. It's a good approach for this product in my
| opinion.
| chrisfinazzo wrote:
| This might also explain why the first party luggage loop
| accessory seems to have been (unfortunately) memory-holed.
| I _think_ third parties still sell them out of excess
| inventory, but they 've been harder to come by in recent
| times.
|
| My current carry-on doesn't have large enough attachment
| points to easily accommodate the Apple leather case's
| keyring, so an updated loop would have been welcome.
| tavavex wrote:
| I think this argument would work better if the AirTag in
| its minimal form wasn't so teardrop-shaped. It feels almost
| like it was designed to be difficult to integrate into
| other environments because it lacks any edges or openings.
| It ensures that anything that could hold it must be at
| least as big as the AirTag itself. It really confuses me
| why they couldn't even allow for a single small hole in its
| edge - it would still leave attachment up to the user, but
| make it far more flexible by letting people just hook it
| onto things. Is it because design had overpowered
| functionality in this product? Is it because this shape is
| somehow mandated by the hardware within it? It confuses me.
| traceroute66 wrote:
| > Building an attachment point into the tag
|
| To be fair, most people I know put their AirTag inside
| something, e.g. inner pocket of a bag.
|
| At which point the necessity for an attachment point becomes
| somewhat moot.
| fainpul wrote:
| Same. I've never seen anyone put an AirTag on a keyring.
|
| Oh, wait...
| Klaster_1 wrote:
| How does that compare to previous AirTag? Whats the industry
| baseline for all of those, maybe gold is 100% recycled anyways
| in most products?
| port11 wrote:
| This is a great question. For example, the Pixel 10 has a
| similar recycling profile, although with less recycled
| plastic.
| ahoka wrote:
| This is just green washing on the level of "93.65% natural
| ingredients".
| reaperducer wrote:
| _This is just green washing on the level of "93.65% natural
| ingredients"._
|
| I keep seeing products in the supermarket with big "Made with
| REAL ingredients!" labels on them.
|
| As opposed to what? Imaginary ingredients?
|
| Classico pasta sauce is the most recent offender.
| ExoticPearTree wrote:
| Chemicals. That's what they mean by real ingredients: no
| chemicals.
|
| Like orange juice: can be from a chemical powder or real
| oranges.
| wmeredith wrote:
| But that's total nonsense. Everything in our physical
| world (including water, air, food, and human bodies) is
| made of chemicals. They can be naturally occurring or
| artificially manufactured.
| ExoticPearTree wrote:
| You can nitpick and be pedantic about the wording I used,
| but if you equate artificial flavors or ingredients with
| natural ones...
| ryandrake wrote:
| Is it really pedantic? Everything is ultimately a
| chemical compound. H2O is a chemical. Where do you draw
| the line between "chemicals" and "not chemicals"? Is it
| more about what you can find in nature? You can find
| acetone in nature.
| snowwrestler wrote:
| This is a good example of how easy it is to fool people
| if they don't have their own understanding of how things
| work.
|
| Highlighting this has been a priority in my parenting. My
| child is having a great time trying to scare friends
| about the dangers of the chemical dihydrogen monoxide,
| which is found in a surprisingly large number of
| manufactured foods.
| ExoticPearTree wrote:
| Right. And wonder bread is awesome for your health.
| array_key_first wrote:
| Nobody said it was. But it's not bad because of
| chemicals, because all bread is created with chemicals.
|
| As for natural versus artificial - that's also bullshit.
| There's many natural ingredients that are poison, and
| many artificial ones that are good for you.
|
| I mean, if I eat home made fried chicken everyday, you
| can bet your ass I'm not gonna live very long.
| snowwrestler wrote:
| Wonder Bread is horrible for your health, but it's not
| because of "chemicals."
|
| Orange juice is also bad for your health BTW!
| reaperducer wrote:
| Asbestos is all natural.
| kstrauser wrote:
| Don't forget poison ivy, amanita mushrooms, and box
| jellyfish.
| port11 wrote:
| What level of materials recycling would be required for you
| to not consider it green washing?
|
| It's a genuine question, since I don't like Apple and agree
| that we buy tons of stuff we don't really need. That said,
| our bicycles can't be insured anymore, but having AirTags at
| least alleviates some of the angst over leaving them in
| public places.
| thiht wrote:
| It's never possible for things to be good with people like
| you. It's not 100% recycled, which would be better. But
| surely, this is better than 0% recycled??
| colechristensen wrote:
| The wholesale material costs for the plastic, gold plating, and
| magnets is all just pennies, if that.
| lucideer wrote:
| I'd be a little wary of these numbers as regulation around
| advertising these kinds of figures normally permits mass
| balance systems[0] (which imo is tantamount to straight-up
| lying).
|
| Mass balance is better than nothing I guess, & I understand the
| practical challenges with going further, but ultimately it's
| not what's implied by the marketing.
|
| [0] https://www.iscc-system.org/news/mass-balance-explained/
| Noaidi wrote:
| Just stating the obvious that not buying one of these things
| that we never seemed to need until they told us we needed it is
| the only way to have "the environment in mind".
| reaperducer wrote:
| _Just stating the obvious that not buying one of these thing
| that we never seemed to need until they told us we needed it_
|
| I never thought I needed one until my wife lost her car keys,
| and the Fiat dealer charged $1,200 for a replacement.
|
| And it's not even the electronics that makes them so
| expensive. Modern car keys aren't like the 1970's where it's
| just a piece of metal with the edges shaved off. Those little
| key cutting kiosks at Home Depot can't cope with today's
| complex engraving.
| kstrauser wrote:
| I have cats. I can't count on things being where I left
| them.
| CGMthrowaway wrote:
| I don't see old-gen airtags for sale on the website. Are they
| throwing them all out?
| mambo_giro wrote:
| Apple rarely offers direct discounts of closeout or excess
| merchandise. Instead to clear out back stock they'll work
| with partner retailers (Amazon, Best Buy, etc.) who don't
| mind the brand perception associated with offering deeper
| discounts.
|
| First-gen AirTags have been on sale on Amazon frequently over
| the last year, and they'll probably drop the price again
| soon.
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| but then the fob also costs $30 :/
| dlcarrier wrote:
| Recycled metals have always been cost effective. Recycled
| plastic is much more expensive than virgin plastic, but it's a
| very small materials cost to start with, likely totaling only a
| few cents.
| opengrass wrote:
| But the real question is... is the speaker still glued on?
| crims0n wrote:
| Is this demonstrably better that just... the devices already in
| your bag? My backpack would be a primary use case... and in it
| are my AirPods, iPad, and MacBook Air. I think any of these can
| use Find My already?
| wrigby wrote:
| Maybe not if one of those items is always in your backpack. A
| few other use cases that I think they're great for:
|
| - Throw one in your checked bag when traveling
|
| - Mount one in a relatively concealed location on your bike
|
| - Keychain (depending on if you're prone to misplacing your
| keys)
| retired wrote:
| In addition to your first use case, multiple airlines are now
| supporting AirTag for bag tracking.
| simonw wrote:
| I use AirTags on car keys and wallets.
| drcongo wrote:
| I have them on my dogs' collars, because squirrels exist.
| somehnguy wrote:
| Cats collars here, as an insurance measure if they were
| ever to sneak outside. They're also handy to locate them
| around the house for various reasons.
| neonmagenta wrote:
| Airtags use Find My as well once you're out of bluetooth range.
| The tag offers more precision once you get into range, down to
| inches supposedly whereas Find My is more of a general 30 ft
| radius
| evilduck wrote:
| For that one item, no not really. But an AirTag has a battery
| life of about a year and there's really no reason to frequently
| remove it. AirPods have a substantially shorter battery life
| and are not guaranteed to be in that bag all the time no matter
| what. Also AirTags are many times cheaper and smaller than your
| listed items and are moderately water and impact resistant. If
| there's something you want to track in addition to your
| backpack you likely don't want to buy spare AirPods (your
| cheapest item) just for that purpose.
| apparent wrote:
| The battery life of AirPods in a case (what GP is referring
| to) is quite long. I don't know how long, but I'd guess
| weeks/months if you're not using them. Obviously a single
| AirPod out of the case would last much less time (though
| still days, IME).
| criddell wrote:
| They might not be for you.
| clickety_clack wrote:
| I don't know how many people have bought them, but I'm going to
| guess it's in the millions since Apple are updating it. All
| those people presumably do find it useful separate from their
| devices.
|
| Personally I don't always have an Apple device in my backpack,
| and when traveling you can't put devices in checked luggage, so
| I use them for those use cases at least.
| mlajtos wrote:
| I was hoping for 6DoF sub-mm realtime tracking. My disappointment
| is immeasurable and my day is ruined.
| Someone wrote:
| Would be great, but that, world-wide, for millions of objects,
| probably is a case of putting your expectations too high.
|
| Has that ever been demonstrated for a single object, even if
| allowing the object to be a thousand times as large as this?
| asadm wrote:
| why do you need that?
| ollybee wrote:
| Is this just to lock out the cheap clones?
| jen729w wrote:
| And they didn't put a small loop in it so you can attach one of
| those skinny little lanyard hoops?!
|
| Attaching these things to anything is their major flaw.
|
| /picard facepalm
| Hamuko wrote:
| How else can they make you buy a keychain holder that costs
| more than the AirTag itself?
| sgt wrote:
| I read this literally just after I ordered 4 AirTags. Great.
| stalfosknight wrote:
| You have 14 days to return them.
| throwaway290 wrote:
| not in all countries
| apparent wrote:
| Not all retailers take returns. But the old ones were likely
| on sale, have been for a while.
| stalfosknight wrote:
| He should have bought them directly from Apple then.
| apparent wrote:
| Third party sellers offer bigger discounts, but lesser
| return policies are generally part of the tradeoff.
| sgt wrote:
| I could return them. But I wonder how long it will take
| before the _new_ AirTags are available in stores?
| stalfosknight wrote:
| store.apple.com will tell you.
| apples_oranges wrote:
| I read they are popular with drug distributors. They ship their
| merch world wide using various hidden channels and couriers and
| this helps keep track of the merch.
| llm_nerd wrote:
| Sounds like one of those "what if..." things someone made up.
|
| AirTags are terrible for surreptitious tracking, alerting every
| iOS user nearby of a tracked product following them around.
|
| I mean, years ago people, such as stalkers, would use it for
| this purpose, but Apple rightly gimped that. There are a lot of
| specialized, self-connected trackers that creeps and criminals
| use.
| Krasnol wrote:
| Well, to be historically accurate: Apple has pretty much been
| forced by the backlash to notify people that they're being
| tracked and even then it only worked if you had an iPhone.
|
| They knew what they were doing and I'm sure the stalking
| aspect helped their sales significantly as it seems to be a
| very popular behaviour in the US.
| llm_nerd wrote:
| Sure, that's accurate. I actually never said otherwise, nor
| did I saint Apple. They were basically forced to do it.
|
| Virtually any tracking or surveillance has a knock-on
| effect that we often overlook in our enthusiasm, but Apple
| absolutely should have foreseen the abuse that would
| happen, and certainly profited off of it.
| dylan604 wrote:
| > the stalking aspect helped their sales significantly
|
| while not denying people have done this, I do have problems
| thinking that it was a significant portion of the sales
| numbers. exaggerating problems is not necessary and
| actually reduces the credibility of the people doing the
| exaggerating
| myself248 wrote:
| And simultaneously gimped the theft-alert use case. I
| embedded one into my labelmaker, which is a notoriously high-
| theft item on jobsites. I can still track it in case I leave
| it behind, which is great.
|
| But if someone steals it, they get an alert that there's an
| airtag traveling with them, and they can go through their
| loot to figure out which item it is, and ditch it, or destroy
| it. In the first case I get my labelmaker back, but I never
| bust the thief.
| apparent wrote:
| I've only been notified about a device traveling with me one
| time, and it was when a relative was riding home with me in
| my car. When we got home, I received a notification that
| there were AirPods Pro traveling with me.
|
| This is consistent with my understanding that it only goes
| off if it travels with you for a very long time, or to your
| house. (Of course, at that point it's too late because they
| know where you live already.)
| llm_nerd wrote:
| To all available information, your home has nothing to do
| with the alert. The alert occurs if one of the trackable
| items (airtag, airpods, etc) is moving with you, but the
| registered owner is not within bluetooth connectivity of
| the device. I've had it happen with my son's airpods a
| number of times because he let his phone battery die,
| triggering the alert for any other iPhone nearby if moving
| simultaneously with this tracker.
|
| I'm not sure what I'm to make of your absence of your
| alerts. Perhaps that happens because you have no such
| trackers moving with you? Like, are you saying you do and
| there are false negatives?
| apparent wrote:
| Apple's documentation indicates that notifications are in
| some cases triggered by the fact that a device has
| followed you to your home or other "significant
| location". [1]
|
| 1: https://support.apple.com/en-us/119874
| llm_nerd wrote:
| It goes the other way around. Enabling significant
| locations allows your device to queue up notifications
| like that to basically be "you have arrived" updates,
| versus while you are driving or otherwise engaged having
| a sudden notification go off, which some people find
| alarming. It doesn't require significant locations, but
| that's when it might decide to wait to tell you.
| apparent wrote:
| I have followed this issue somewhat carefully over the
| years and my understanding differs from yours. Can you
| show sources that indicate that it is the other way
| around? I have experienced the notification coming at
| home even when the phone was not set to a driving mode
| beforehand, so notifications would not have been
| silenced.
| stevewodil wrote:
| I put one in my car when I shipped it across the country - it
| was great to be able to check where it was and know when it was
| getting close!
| port3000 wrote:
| Great to hear but it's still the same shape. I really want a
| 'credit card' shaped version I can slide into my wallet.
| 4fterd4rk wrote:
| You can buy a third party wallet card that works with the Find
| My network just like an AirTag.
| amenghra wrote:
| I could be wrong but third party tags bet a subset of the
| tracking capabilities? Ie less accurate/less likely to be
| found.
| dewey wrote:
| I'm always tempted to buy one of these but most of them seem
| to be one time usage, and don't have a way to recharge. That
| always seems very wasteful to me.
|
| Any recommendations for a rechargable but thin one, AirTag
| itself is too thick for regular wallets.
| tky wrote:
| The Eufy SmartTrack card is great! Mine is non-rechargeable
| and going on year 3. They have released a rechargeable
| version called the "E30".
| object_Object wrote:
| https://www.eufy.com/uk/products/t87b1011?variant=487583086
| 0...
|
| I've been using one of these with Find My for over a year.
| I've not done anything with the Eufy app, just the Find My
| app itself. It lacks the precision find, but you can play a
| sound through the Find My app / get directions / share the
| item / flag the item as lost / do left behind and it works
| well.
| fragmede wrote:
| The other direction is just get a wallet that supports a
| real airtag. Because my wallet is so important to me, the
| name brand airtag, with UWB-enhanced findability, is worth
| swapping out my wallet rather than getting a sub-par
| credit-card find my compatible device. nb, I came to this
| conclusion after getting an aftermarket credit card device
| and found it lacking.
|
| https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BZ8C5N7H
| RASBR89 wrote:
| I have one you can recharge wirelessly. Forget the brand
| but it's been working well
| Hamuko wrote:
| I like that it's the same shape. My backbag has an AirTag
| pocket, so I can just swap out a first-gen AirTag for a second-
| gen if I need to.
|
| I think there are also several third-party wallet trackers that
| integrate with the Find My network.
| ubercore wrote:
| I bought a third party one to do just that, and it's worked
| fine for me: https://chipolo.net/en-us/products/chipolo-card-
| spot
|
| I think there are other options too
| 542458 wrote:
| Do the third party ones have UWB/"Precision Finding"?
| ubercore wrote:
| Nope, but you can play sound. For my wallet it's enough to
| know I didn't leave it somewhere, then sound is enough.
| Sorry should have mentioned it's not a perfect replacement.
| ghaff wrote:
| Yeah. Although I'm normally pretty good, it's mostly what
| did I leave my wallet under in my house?
| jsheard wrote:
| There's a newer version: https://chipolo.net/en-
| us/products/chipolo-card
|
| Notably they now support both the Apple and Android
| ecosystems from a single hardware SKU, although only one at a
| time, and the formerly disposable battery can now be
| recharged with a standard Qi wireless charger.
| mikepurvis wrote:
| I'm interested to hear this. I had very mixed experience a
| few years ago with the Seinxon finder card; it wasn't
| reliably in contact to make it beep, even when I was standing
| right beside it, but worse it would semi-regularly go into
| anti-stalker mode and start beeping and spamming iPhones
| around me with scary-looking notices. This second behaviour
| was obviously a deal-breaker so I discontinued use of them.
| (Looks like the company still exists but is now selling newer
| versions of the cards I bought from them)
|
| Having recently switched to Android I was tempted to give
| Chipolo products a try, but this reddit thread disuaded me,
| as multiple users there are reporting the exact kinds of
| issues that I experienced previously: https://www.reddit.com/
| r/Chipolo/comments/1n4m4j3/chipolo_po...
| chasebank wrote:
| Does it tell a thief a chipolo is following them around like
| the apple tag?
| thehigherlife wrote:
| airtag compatible, shows up in Find My:
| https://nomadgoods.com/products/tracking-card
| prodigycorp wrote:
| Do these have the ultra wide band chip? you lose a lot of
| utility without it.
| thehigherlife wrote:
| From the FAQ: Does Tracking Card Air support Precision
| Finding? You can track your items from anywhere in the
| world using the Apple Find My app, but sound alerts only
| work when you're within about 150 feet. Since Apple doesn't
| yet support Ultra Wideband (UWB) technology for third-party
| trackers, Tracking Card Air doesn't include Precision
| Finding at this time.
| ghaff wrote:
| I haven't stress tested it but I have a Spotfinder in my small
| wallet.
| ehsankia wrote:
| Atuvos one at 1.6mm and UGreen one at 1.7mm are great, though
| one time battery is annoying. There are some that have
| wireless charging, though thicker.
| ghaff wrote:
| SpotMinder is supposedly wireless charging though haven't
| tried.
|
| Have one in my wallet. Will probably get some more AirTags.
| dbcurtis wrote:
| I have a wallet with a pocket for an airtag.
| prodigycorp wrote:
| I have ADHD - which is hardly uncommon in this economy - and the
| improvements to finding AirPods Pro with Find My have been a
| godsend. I use it almost every day. I've lost so many airpods in
| the past. I hope we see the same improvements to air tags.
|
| ps, Apple is driving me nuts with their branding. With is AirPods
| one word and Find My two words?
| swe_dima wrote:
| my parents live in Russia and my grandma has alzheimer's, so as a
| present "for her" I bought an airtag - so in case my mom loses
| grandma in a crowd she can be found.
|
| Little did I know, GPS jammers around the city make my grandma
| appear 50km away.
|
| Not Apple's fault of course.
| etchalon wrote:
| Wait what
| gusgus01 wrote:
| Russia does pretty widespread GPS jamming and spoofing both
| in their country as well as across the Baltics and Nordics
| (and others). If a phone is receiving bad GPS data when it
| reports sensing the tag, the tag location will reflect that
| bad GPS data and not reality.
| etchalon wrote:
| Thanks for explanation. I had absolutely no awareness GPS
| jamming was a thing, let alone at scale.
| dmix wrote:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krasukha
| swe_dima wrote:
| my runner friends hate it, suddenly your Garmin can't
| show your pace and distance properly. (I am very much
| aware it's a 1st world problem to have in times of war)
| jerlam wrote:
| The United States (who created and operates GPS) also has
| the ability to make civilian GPS receivers in a specific
| area or region area less accurate, in case of war. I
| would assume that other countries' systems (Russia,
| China, maybe not EU) also have this ability.
|
| GPS was primarily developed as a military technology. It
| was intentionally inaccurate for all civilians up until
| the year 2000.
| Bigpet wrote:
| Shouldn't most comodity GPS receivers also be GLONASS
| compatible (I get that Galileo is more niche and might not
| be included).
|
| Does the Sensor Apple uses not use GLONASS in Russia? Or is
| it cheapo Android Phones picking up the tag and then
| sending GPS coords into cloud?
|
| edit: Nvm, I might be dumb, I guess unless your jamming
| includes all commodity GNSS it's pretty useless.
| nasretdinov wrote:
| They have had GLONASS for ages too, but obviously they
| have to jam everything, otherwise it's not going to
| prevent drones and such from working
| sofixa wrote:
| > Or is it cheapo Android Phones picking up the tag and
| then sending GPS coords into cloud?
|
| AirTags have no integration with Android devices. There's
| a shitty app from Apple you can install that allows you
| to scan for AirTags nearby, one shot. It's supposedly
| against stalkers, but it's practically useless. There a
| bunch of other community apps with varying features like
| finding and notifying you there's an AirTag nearby. But
| you can't even track your own AirTags from an Android
| device, because Apple have decided you _must_ do it from
| an iDevice. No browser, no Android app. You can check
| your iPhone 's location via the browser, but not the
| AirTag.
|
| The Android ecosystem has an alternative thing, but
| depending on the phone manufacturer you have to opt in to
| your device being used to track trackers around you.
|
| When I travel to places with low iPhone market share, I
| always have one tracker of each ecosystem, just in case.
| Bigpet wrote:
| Oh, thank for the correction. I must've muddled it up in
| my mind with the contact tracing integration that had
| during Covid.
| mig39 wrote:
| AirTag itself doesn't have GPS, of course. It depends on the
| devices that communicate with the AirTag having precise
| location. IF you have a phone in Russia, are your maps apps off
| by 50km these days?
| somehnguy wrote:
| I would assume the inaccuracy is due to the various phones
| that pick up the airtag pings GPS being jammed, reporting
| AirTags nowhere near where they actually are.
| retired wrote:
| Makes sense. Would be pretty cool if Apple could find a way
| to correct GPS jamming using accelerometers and some logic.
| If your GPS location jump 50 kilometers in 2 minutes,
| ignore GPS and use cell tower + accelerometer. Maybe create
| some sort of mesh network, using other phones and nearby
| SSIDs to get a makeshift location positioning.
|
| That does come with the risk of Tim Cook falling out of a
| window.
| kube-system wrote:
| Most current phones already use these techniques (and
| more) just simply to account for poor signals, which have
| long been an issue with GPS because signal strength and
| SNR are inherently very low.
| opengrass wrote:
| The AirTag does not have a GPS receiver. When anyone's iPhone
| discovers the tag, it sends their device's location to Apple
| servers with "by the way, this AirTag is in range." If cellular
| location is inaccurate then good luck.
| kylehotchkiss wrote:
| iPhone SE for next gift? it can snap back to correct location
| when the jammers are off or the phone infers location from
| tower etc
| jedisct1 wrote:
| The AirTag is a fantastic device.
|
| If only it were usable with an Android phone :(
| Brajeshwar wrote:
| Apple AirTag is one of those interesting products that you don't
| think you need until you use it. An Apple thing that just works
| as advertised and is cheap enough that you can keep picking them
| up at Airports, without the guilty feeling that usually comes
| with buying high-priced Apple products, such as the Polishing
| Cloth. And when you order it online, the nice engravings are fun
| for my daughters. They like it when it is pinged, finding their
| toys and bags, and it is worth the price tag.
|
| I had to put in a few of my daughter's pencil pouches and some
| toys; they are cheaper than the AirTags and, financially, make no
| sense to lose an AirTag that costs more than the items being
| tracked. But hey, daughter is happy, and that covers up for the
| cost.
| WorldMaker wrote:
| There's a value in sentimentality that doesn't always reflect
| in the financial value of a thing.
| MisterBiggs wrote:
| I was really hoping for a new form factor or new killer features.
| Its too bad that the general public can't behave themselves with
| simple tech like this
| anton-107 wrote:
| does this update also enable precision finding from the watch?
| would this start working with the previous generation of airtags
| as well (currently you can use precision finding from your
| iphone, but not from the watch)
| smith7018 wrote:
| According the MacRumors, yes but they cant confirm if its only
| for the new AirTags yet:
|
| "watchOS 26.2.1 is also coming, and it expands Precision
| Finding to the Apple Watch Series 9 and later, and Apple Watch
| Ultra 2 and later. We have not yet confirmed if this is for the
| new AirTag only or also works with the original model."
| philsnow wrote:
| From the linked article:
|
| > For the first time, users can use Precision Finding on Apple
| Watch Series 9 or later, or Apple Watch Ultra 2 or later, to
| find their AirTag, bringing a powerful experience to the wrist.
| wslh wrote:
| Great that they are improving a relatively low profile product. I
| imagine that the warning of using AirTag on pets is just for
| regulatory purposes?
| kstrauser wrote:
| Yep. They continue to be excellent pet trackers. "They're _not_
| for use with pets, _wink wink_ ", when if you set out to build
| a pet tracker from scratch, that's what you'd hope to end up
| with.
| ianschmitz wrote:
| Pet trackers in which situation though? The times I've wanted
| a tracker on my dog is when we're out in the woods for a hike
| and I worry he bolts after an animal or similar. I can't see
| how an AirTag would help in that scenario.
| dylan604 wrote:
| That's the part of the "hope" people have with the AirTag
| is that their pet will happen to wander close to another
| compatible Apple device to update the tracking. I assume
| this is also why they are not the "suggested" use
| kstrauser wrote:
| That's a good point. You're right: they'd be useless there,
| unless you were so close to your dog that you could hear it
| anyway. I live in a city and a lost dog would be close to
| any number of people with phones at any given time, and
| it'd be very useful there.
| jshier wrote:
| They're great if you're in a populated area. If you're
| tracking pets in the country, you'll never see them, as there
| aren't any relay devices out in the woods.
| prodigycorp wrote:
| The greatest success of AirTags is its silent refutation of the
| clamoring concern trolling.
|
| It's been, what, six years now? The media would pay hand over
| fist for an airtags stalking story and how many have there
| actually been?
| throwaway290 wrote:
| You mean how many where perp was caught?
| superxpro12 wrote:
| I mean, i remember a lot of posts about people using them for
| stalking. It's unclear if this has been addressed or if the
| concern has been deprioritized, or if apple solved the problem
| somehow.
|
| I mean it was enough of a concern that Android added a "detect
| airtags" feature to the base android OS.
| WorldMaker wrote:
| Apple had its version of "stalking detection" (that
| equivalent of Android's "detect airtags") from early rollout.
| (There's a screenshot in the attached article even.) Some of
| the scrutiny and early complaints _was_ that ecosystem divide
| that needed Android to also support at least a basic form of
| that same feature before people would feel safe, and everyone
| knew that Apple themselves weren 't going to build the
| Android version.
| minton wrote:
| > Designed exclusively for tracking objects, and not people or
| pets, the new AirTag incorporates...
|
| Interesting to call out that it's not designed for pets. I know
| several people with AirTags on their pet collars.
| coderatlarge wrote:
| why not pets?
| js2 wrote:
| I think mostly it's a chew risk for dogs and won't help if
| the dog is far from the AirTag network. I still have one on
| my dog anyway (he's not a chewer) and my daughter puts one on
| her cat occasionally. (Both pets are microchipped too, of
| course.)
| c-hendricks wrote:
| I bought one for my cat, never did help with finding him,
| just the general area.
|
| They're not great for tracking things that move on their own,
| or things that avoid people.
| ccvannorman wrote:
| We use them on our cats and have found the trouble-maker
| cat 3 times out of 3 when needed (in an urban apartment
| area; most recently the cat was scared by a noise which may
| have kept her hidden out all night in the cold, unless we
| had found her/shooed her back to the house)
| kube-system wrote:
| 1. they way the network works, it works better for inanimate
| objects that don't move around
|
| 2. they contain small parts that pets might inadvertently
| eat, and some of the collars that exist for them have been
| known to snag on things and entrap pets.
| yabones wrote:
| They work best for things that a human has to move, and since
| a good chunk of humans (at least in US/CA) have iPhones, the
| movement of the physical thing will be tracked by an iPhone
| fairly reliably. Any time the critter is outside the range of
| an i-device picking it up the location will be stale. There
| isn't really a way around that, since GPS/5G radios are a lot
| more power hungry than the occasional bluetooth pings an
| airtag broadcasts.
| HumblyTossed wrote:
| Legal reason, perhaps?
|
| Apple doesn't, maybe, want to explain why these are for
| tracking the living?
| herpdyderp wrote:
| I tried AirTags once. It beeped non stop on my own possessions. I
| don't understand how anyone uses these things.
| kstrauser wrote:
| That's not the expected experience, and not the one other
| people have.
| _ph_ wrote:
| I once bought 4 air tags, never got to work them in any
| useful sense. I keep getting warnings about leaving my keys
| behind, which are in my pocket. I don't recall any time being
| warned about leaving things behind when I did. Can't really
| locate things a few meters away.
| kstrauser wrote:
| That's so odd! They've worked exactly as promised for me. I
| never, ever get warnings about my own tags, or my wife's
| tags that she's shared with me. Not even once. And
| yesterday I used them to find my keys that the cats had
| relocated to across the house.
|
| I don't have any explanation for how our experiences could
| be so different, but they are. Mine even did the cool thing
| where you can watch your luggage move through an airport
| until you join up with it.
| _ph_ wrote:
| Just found out that the one active remaining tag on my
| keychain stopped working in September without me
| noticing.
| WorldMaker wrote:
| Generally you tag your home as a trusted location, which
| eliminates most regular pings. Then you make sure that your
| Find My shows all of your tags; if you missed enrolling one and
| it still pings as a "stranger's tag" that can be a cause of
| confusion. (If you live with someone else, I've heard it is
| useful that you share your Find My data with each other.)
|
| When actually traveling with your stuff there's a personal
| comfort question of how comfortable you feel in setting things
| like hotel rooms as "trusted" so you don't get a lot of pings
| when you leave things behind intentionally in places like hotel
| rooms. I think that's my biggest ask for AirTags is an easier
| way to set explicitly time-bound trusts: trust this exact hotel
| room until my checkout date; trust this exact office space
| until the end of this work day.
| rafram wrote:
| Is this... skeuomorphism in an Apple UI? In 2026?
|
| https://www.apple.com/newsroom/images/2026/01/apple-introduc...
| kstrauser wrote:
| No. Skeuomorphism would have you dragging the AirTag from a
| picture of your pocket to a picture of someone else's pocket,
| and you'd lose the ability to track it yourself then, because
| it would belong to the other person now.
|
| Skeuomorphism is more about making the UI work like the real
| world, not just look like it.
| eurotechie wrote:
| "With its updated internal design, the new AirTag is 50 percent
| louder than the previous generation, enabling users to hear their
| AirTag from up to 2x farther than before."
|
| Curious about getting 2x the distance from 1.5x the "loudness", I
| would have thought the inverse? Maybe there is nuance to this
| though.
| dylan604 wrote:
| loudness is logarithmic
| helloguillecl wrote:
| Airtag is the reason of why I stil have my favourite hand
| luggage.
|
| I had just sat down on the train from Zurich to Basel. Suddenly,
| someone sat down in front of me. He looked suspicious, but I
| didn't pay much attention. Just before the train departed, he
| picked up what I thought were his belongings and left.
|
| Twenty minutes later, already on the way to Basel, I looked
| toward where I had left my suitcase. It was gone. That was when I
| realized that the person who had sat in front of me was a thief.
|
| However, he hadn't counted on the fact that I have an AirTag in
| every backpack and suitcase.
|
| So I was able to see where the thief was and where he was moving.
| I considered going to retrieve my suitcase myself, but while
| traveling back to Zurich, I called the Zurich Police and, as the
| thief kept moving, I told them where he was.
|
| Twenty minutes later I received a call from the police informing
| me that they had found my suitcase with my belongings, matching
| the description I had given.
|
| But also the thief and his accomplice.
| ghaff wrote:
| I do use airtags for this purpose. I also expect (and I read)
| that most police departments won't pay the slightest bit of
| attention to your reports.
| piperswe wrote:
| I also know from experience that Zurich police will chase an
| AirTag location with vigor.
| ghaff wrote:
| That sounds... unique from everything I've heard.
| seanmcdirmid wrote:
| Switzerland sends in swat for noise complaints, they would
| definitely care about a thief that could be caught.
| kshacker wrote:
| Is it all over or just some parts of the countries? I ask,
| amused, since I have never been there except a 2 day trip
| to Geneva in 1992 or so.
| jules-jules wrote:
| Some Kantons are more easy going than others but overall
| the police are not to fuck around with.
| traceroute66 wrote:
| > most police departments won't pay the slightest bit of
| attention to your reports
|
| Its sort of a combination of two reasons.
|
| First in many cities, police departments are underfunded. And
| so running around looking for your stolen phone or whatever
| minor item is low on their to-do list compared to say,
| stopping the local drug-gangs from shooting their brains out.
|
| Second, for minor thefts most insurance companies just need a
| quick box-tick "police crime report number" before paying
| out. So if the police know they can get you off their backs
| just by quickly giving you a report number, well....
| ghaff wrote:
| And it's probably under your deductible anyway. And
| replacing various cards is your deal with your credit card
| etc. companies. Relatively few of us carry around a lot of
| cash.
| Schmerika wrote:
| > compared to say, stopping the local drug-gangs from
| shoting their brains out
|
| I'm guessing people have that impression from TV, but it
| doesn't seem to match reality.
|
| > the data suggests that officers spend relatively little
| time responding to major violent crimes: 4%, 3.7% and 4.1%
| in the three locations, respectively.
|
| - https://www.freethink.com/society/how-police-spend-their-
| tim...
| ryandrake wrote:
| Which raises the obvious question: If they're not
| responding to either violent crimes or nonviolent crimes,
| what are they doing all day?
| reaperducer wrote:
| _If they 're not responding to either violent crimes or
| nonviolent crimes, what are they doing all day?_
|
| According to a police administrator I once knew, filling
| out all the endless paperwork that makes the studies
| possible so people can complain about what little time
| cops spend fighting crime.
| jq-r wrote:
| Just like that excellent Yes Minister episode about
| hospitals - I imagine they have more then enough internal
| busywork so they have no time for their customers. Which
| the older am I the more this seems true.
| seanmcdirmid wrote:
| Thankfully you were in Switzerland rather than the states, I
| just never see American police caring about that.
| metadat wrote:
| The police in Spain will also not care, in my experience.
| They acted completely helpless regardless of how much
| information I gave them.
|
| My solution now is to travel very light.
| ifwinterco wrote:
| Switzerland is the Singapore of Europe (I mean this in a good
| way!) - the state just functions in a way that other European
| countries can only dream of
| seanmcdirmid wrote:
| I spent a couple of years in Lausanne so am aware. Swiss
| police don't mess around, you need to follow the rules if
| you want to live there.
| plingamp wrote:
| My car got broken into in Oakland, California. Multiple
| pieces of luggage stolen (yes, my fault for leaving it in the
| car in the first place). Luckily I had an AirTag that showed
| the exact location of the stolen items. I called the police
| but they said they couldn't do anything. Apparently, even if
| I had the location the thief would have to invite them in.
| Regardless, I was put on a waiting list, they finally called
| me back 3 days later. I promptly left the state a few months
| later.
| gruez wrote:
| >Apparently, even if I had the location the thief would
| have to invite them in.
|
| I mean, isn't that good? 4th amendment, warrants from a
| judge, and all that.
| cbolton wrote:
| Presumably they could easily get a warrant with that
| information, if they cared to ask.
| alexjplant wrote:
| Depends on the jurisdiction.
|
| One time I was driving down a twoo-lane road with a police
| car a few hundred feet behind me. An oncoming pickup truck
| veered several feet over the center line and almost hit me. I
| flagged the police down to tell them and they were nonplussed
| even though they literally saw it happen. Drunk driving, a
| greater threat than property theft, was of little consequence
| to them.
|
| On the other side of the country my motorcycle got stolen and
| the police found it the next day. I picked it up from the tow
| yard shortly thereafter.
|
| YMMV.
| hshdhdhj4444 wrote:
| America is weirdly nonplussed by destruction and deaths
| caused by a car.
| ehsankia wrote:
| That's awesome. I'm glad that trackers have reached a price
| point, reliability and form factors that I can easily put one
| in everything I care about. I even have card ones in my wallet,
| my steam deck / e-reader case, etc.
|
| Also, most of these have usb-c / wireless charging, so I don't
| have to mess with random cell batteries every 6 months.
| lxgr wrote:
| Given that the battery in my Airtag lasts about a year, I'd
| rather have to exchange a CR2032 once per year than to buy a
| new tracker whenever the built-in rechargeable battery
| inevitably dies. (I think there are actually rechargeable
| CR2032s too - best of both worlds?)
| teoruiz wrote:
| Back in 2011 (!) I went to a wedding in Denia, a medium-sized
| town on the Mediterranean coast of Spain.
|
| The day after the wedding we went to a restaurant by the sea to
| have some hangover paella, part of the wedding celebrations.
| Weddings in Spain are usually 2 or 3 day affairs. Anyway, since
| we were travelling back to Madrid later that day we left our
| luggage in the trunk of the car, not visible from the outside.
| We locked the doors and off for paella.
|
| Or so we thought: some bad guys were jamming the car key
| frequencies so the car didn't actually lock. They hit jackpot
| with my bag: my Canon IXUS camera (I loved that camera), my
| Kindle 3G, my MacBook Pro and my iPad... with 3G.
|
| When we found out later that day we went to the local Guardia
| Civil and told them the story. I opened "Find My" on my phone
| and told them exactly where the bad guys were, all the way in
| Valencia already.
|
| You should have seen the face of the two-days-shy-from-retiring
| officer when I told him that my iPad was connected to the
| internet and broadcasting its location continuously. Remember
| this was 2011.
|
| So they sent a police car to check out the area and found a
| suspiciously hot car. They noted it down and did some old-
| fashioned policing the rest of the summer. Two months later I
| got a call: they had found them and waited on them to continue
| stealing using the same MO, until they had a large enough stash
| that they could be charged with a worse crime.
|
| They had found my bag, my MacBook and my iPad. The smaller
| items had already been sold on the black market.
|
| It still is one of my favourite hacker stories. I went to court
| as a witness and retold the whole thing. The look on the
| judge's face was also priceless.
| reaperducer wrote:
| Similar story for me. Except in Rome, and the ending wasn't
| happy because all I could do is watch my wife's iPhone go to
| Tunisia where it disappeared.
|
| Still, in those very early days of "Find my" I could see how
| this was going to eventually change things.
| dostick wrote:
| Did you tell them that you have a particular set of... tags?
| varispeed wrote:
| > I called the Zurich Police and, as the thief kept moving, I
| told them where he was. Twenty minutes later I received a call
| from the police informing me that they had found my suitcase
| with my belongings, matching the description I had given.
|
| So refreshing to hear. Here in the UK the police would be
| annoyed by your call and at best would give you crime ref
| number (usually after mentioning that you will file a complaint
| if they don't) to take up with your insurance provider.
| robertwt7 wrote:
| yeah this should be the standard, same here in Australia
| unfortunately the police will just pretend to care by taking
| more information and then does nothing.
| joezydeco wrote:
| _The new AirTag requires a compatible iPhone with iOS 26 or
| later, or iPad with iPadOS 26 or later._
|
| Oh come the fuck _ON_. I 'm not installing your silly fuzzy UI,
| Apple. Get over it.
| apparent wrote:
| For real. This just went from insta-purchase to "guess I'll
| have one someday, but not anytime soon".
|
| I use these to help keep track of my kids, but I'll probably
| get them AWs before I upgrade to 26 in all honesty.
| _ph_ wrote:
| I have an older AirTag, which cannot be seen by my iPhone any
| more but gives a slight beep whenever it gets shaken. Anyone ever
| heard of the behavior?
| wmeredith wrote:
| The battery needs changed.
| _ph_ wrote:
| Changing the battery was the first thing I did. No change.
| But if that is the official signal for "battery low", I can
| try a few more. Thanks.
| brigham wrote:
| Make sure the battery doesn't have bitterant coating on the
| edge where it meets the AirTag contact.
|
| The first time I replaced my AirTag batteries I had to
| remove some of the coating or it wouldn't power the AirTag.
| _ph_ wrote:
| Thats worth a try, because if the batteries have that,
| trying several ones of the same brand would produce the
| same results.
|
| Now, do I try to test this by licking the battery or
| should I try to sand the surface without pre-testing? :)
| radicality wrote:
| Oh yeah totally, that "feature" of a Duracell cr2032
| battery screwed me over in that exact case. They just
| don't work at all with an AirTag (battery bought from
| afaik reputable supplier, Home Depot). Switched to
| Energizer cr2032 and it's been great.
| _ph_ wrote:
| Tried with a cleaned new battery. It beeps when I put the
| battery in, that is it. When I scan for unknown objects,
| I get shown an air tag, but it doesn't tell me anything
| about it. So probably I should just remove the battery -
| I must have gone through a heap of them debugging this -
| and just smash it.
| MikeFez wrote:
| IIRC, this indicates that it's linked to someone else's
| account, and has not been shared with you. The "beep when
| moved" feature is to alert people they're being tracked.
|
| For example, I let my mother in law use luggage of mine with an
| airtag still in it and every time she moved it after the first
| day or so, it would play a noise.
| _ph_ wrote:
| I had the thought too, but there is no way anyone else could
| have gotten physical control over this and shouldn't I see
| that AirTag when I scan for things in my surrounding as an
| anti-tracking protection?
| skygazer wrote:
| I've had similar issues -- consider it a bug -- and unpair
| and re-pair with your phone, and likely the issue will go
| away.
| _ph_ wrote:
| I think I unpaired it, but I cannot pair it again, as it
| isn't recognized by the iPhone at all.
| fragmede wrote:
| > and a louder speaker
|
| That's great, but could they do something about what plays on the
| speaker? It's all pretty in that Apple sort of way, but the fact
| that its volume goes up and down makes it harder to find. Y'know,
| exactly the one thing you're trying to do with it?
| insane_dreamer wrote:
| AirTag (and FindMy for devices like phones, tablets, etc.) might
| be my favorite iOS/Apple feature and one that I use regularly.
| duxup wrote:
| I get the optics about tracking people...
|
| But man that's one of my best use cases, toss a tag in my kid's
| pocket when we are somewhere busy. I used one on my older in-law
| who tended to wander.
|
| They work great for that.
| rconti wrote:
| > Maintaining the same form factor as the original, the new
| AirTag is compatible with all existing AirTag accessories
|
| I'm glad this appears to have been a focal point of the design.
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