Air Tag Tussle
Apple’s Air Tags are typically used to monitor the location of personal devices, such as cell phones, tablets, laptops, keys, or even luggage, but a Portland lawyer put them to use in an unusual way, and made an unusual discovery. Michael Fuller, a lawyer who fought for the homeless in and around Portland, had a notion that city contactors who were charged with clearing the tents of the homeless camps in the area, were violating the law by throwing away such items. Under local law, on unsanitary items and those with no apparent use could be thrown away, while all others must be stored in a warehouse for at least 30 days.
Getting a bit of advanced information about a potential site clearing, he attached Air Tags to 16 items and tracked their locations after the site was cleared. As it turned out a number of the items would up in a recycling transfer station rather than the warehouse. What makes this unusual is that based on the Air Tag system, those workers who had been carrying their iPhones during the process were likely the one’s who helped track the items as the system identifies tagged items when any iPhone gets nearby. Since this is done anonymously, the city contractors did not know they were revealing their own shortcomings and validating the claims of the homeless, who had seen personal items leave the tents but not appear in the warehouse. While turning off your iPhone will keep it from identifying any of your own nefarious deeds, but all it will take is someone wandering near the tag to reveal its location to the network, so turning off your iPhone when stealing packages from neighbor’s porches could lead to a day in court.
Getting a bit of advanced information about a potential site clearing, he attached Air Tags to 16 items and tracked their locations after the site was cleared. As it turned out a number of the items would up in a recycling transfer station rather than the warehouse. What makes this unusual is that based on the Air Tag system, those workers who had been carrying their iPhones during the process were likely the one’s who helped track the items as the system identifies tagged items when any iPhone gets nearby. Since this is done anonymously, the city contractors did not know they were revealing their own shortcomings and validating the claims of the homeless, who had seen personal items leave the tents but not appear in the warehouse. While turning off your iPhone will keep it from identifying any of your own nefarious deeds, but all it will take is someone wandering near the tag to reveal its location to the network, so turning off your iPhone when stealing packages from neighbor’s porches could lead to a day in court.
RSS Feed