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this post was submitted on 14 Oct 2023
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Here's the thing about all this. Yes, tech existed before airtags. But apple made the tech incredibly accurate, incredibly cheap, and marketed the hell out of it.
On top of that, the protection features have been massively lacking, especially around people who do not use iPhones.When they first came out, a few companies did tests on their employees around air tags. They would slip air tags into their car. The end result was that some people noticed, especially iPhone users. Many did not.
Undoubtedly, there are people dead today who would be alive if airtags didn't exist or if apple had done more.
And yes, we do hold companies up to some level of responsibility. Of course we do.
An edit to say I'm disheartened that so many people are willing to say it's okay, if apple do this. The main complaint is that other tiny companies also make GPS trackers so why should apple be punished for making something that has lead to abuse and death.
We should be collectively holding major corporations to task, not standing up for corporations right to cause harm. Even if they make your favourite phone.
It’s not like there aren’t any trackers that lack any and all protection. I don’t really see the manufacturer at fault here.
Mini GPS trackers have been available for cheap (cheaper than AirTags) for years and they’re practically undetectable. No apps are going to help you there.
Apple built detection features, beeping alarms, and even apps for platforms beyond their own to aid people in not being tracked against their will. Tile didn’t. I don’t know any other trackers that have put as much effort into the problem.
Google wouldn’t implement OS-level features for competitors’ products so people suggesting Apple shouldn’t have launched until their competitors added in support are being unrealistic.
Here’s the thing about all this. Yes, tech existed before airtags. But apple made the tech incredibly accurate, incredibly cheap, and marketed the hell out of it.
They launched it with no regard to just how dangerous it would be, then waited a significant period of time for multiple reports to come forward that emphasized the dangers, then made safeguards after the fact. And finally didn't implement those safeguards in a way that could be used by all users across the board right away. They were a step behind in protecting consumers pretty much every step of the way in this. It's not like this didn't take years to get to this point.
We can stop pretending they didn't create a spy device for the masses.
They launched the airbag in April 2021 after a massive ad campaign.
They got the first reports of airtag stalking pretty much right away. And for apple users they created and implemented some protections right away. But it took them about 9 months to launch an android app and that app wasn't even compatible with all android phones.
So finally two years later in 2023 they made it so you can detect air tags with android without the app. But only if you're using a phone with android 6.0 or higher. I know it sounds unrealistic to us techies that people might be using phones that aren't 6.0 or higher. But about 2.79% of android phones still run lollipop.
This also does nothing at all to protect people using flip phones or phones that don't run android or apple software. There's a cult following for dumb phones and people should be able to use whatever device they want for communication without just being left with no safeguards from one or the largest tech companies in the world.
Saying they don't owe anything to consumers doesn't make sense. We have literally gone after tech companies for not safeguarding consumers before. An example is several IOT baby monitors that were hacked and later pulled from shelves. The difference seems to be that this is a big tech company with a well known name brand.
We even saw this with kids buying things on parents credit cards and the company being held liable after a class action suit. So what I feel like a lot of people in this thread are saying is that this company bears no responsibility for its product being used for illegal purposes because those purposes lead to murder instead of fraud. Because I have yet to find a thread lamenting that Amazon was held liable for allowing kids to make in app purchases on their parents credit cards.
You literally linked a link that backed up what I said. Did you read that article?
"Apple announced that this app was coming in June, promising that it would allow Android users to find potentially malicious trackers being used without their knowledge. Unlike on iOS, though, it doesn’t seem like this app will constantly do scans in the background and alert you if something is up — it’s purely a manual search. Tracker Detect also doesn’t help you keep track of the AirTags attached to an Apple account, so it’s not helping Android users actually use AirTags."
I literally said it took them 9 months from the time of the launch of the air tag to get an app for android up and running. You didn't read. 9 months from April is December.
What bit was incorrect? And don't give me BS about reading the article. If you want to refute what I said I'm gonna need a direct quote because literally most of my post came from multiple articles on the subject going back to May of 2021.
https://www.cnet.com/tech/mobile/apple-launches-airtags-and-find-my-detector-app-for-android-in-effort-to-boost-privacy/
This article is dated December 13th 2021. At that time Apple's Tracker Detect app did not even do active scans without input from the user.
When it launched it wasn't available internationally, and only worked on Android 9 or higher devices.
"But it's only available for Android 9 and higher, which rules out many of the devices at the cheap end of the Android ecosystem which are often used by vulnerable populations."
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/12/apples-android-app-scan-airtags-necessary-step-forward-more-anti-stalking
Additionally you can modify airtags to remove or disable the speaker and the Tracker Detect app doesn't work the way the iPhone app does on newer iPhones so the app will make a noise but the tracker won't if the speaker is disabled making it harder to locate. It may also be harder to locate in the event that you're using the android app because it's not a system level app so it won't use every single accelerometer and what not in the phone to give you an accurate location for the air tag.
You can use NFC to scan an airtag in the event that you find one. But if someone tapes an air tag to your gas tank or the underside of your car it's unlikely that you'll find it unless you know you're being tracked and even if you do find it (with an updated app that does scans etc). That doesn't mean everyone will specifically because of incompatibility with older phones and with non apple non android variant phones.
Oh. You mean the bit where I said active scanning was finally available in 2023. From Google. But only on devices with android lollipop or higher?
Yep. Completely factual.
Undoubtedly, there are people dead today who would be alive if hammers didn’t exist or if manufacturers had made them softer.
Undoubtedly, there are people dead today who would be alive if paracetamol didn’t exist or if chemists had done more.
Undoubtedly, there are people dead today who would be alive if cars didn’t exist or if the auto industry didn’t lie for years about the dangers of leaded fuel.
Not for anyone using any android variant below android ~~6.0~~ 9.0. There's still users using phones stuck on ~~lollipop~~ Pie.
Your answer to "you may be killed by someone using a defacto spy device marketed by one of the largest tech companies in existence" is to "get a new phone". Jesus. Do you hear yourself?
Did I say anything about banning the product?
What I'm hearing is a lot of whataboutism in this whole thread. Nobody should be allowed to just track you without your permission. Privacy laws should be enforced and should be strengthened to prevent this type of thing.
It doesn't matter that the auto industry poisoned people for 100 years while lying about the dangers. It matters that leaded fuel isn't used anymore because people and their governments did something about it (leaded fuel is only used in aircraft, racing cars, farm equipment, and marine engines but not in consumer vehicles since 1975 in the US).
It doesn't matter that drug companies in the past haven't given people a complete list of the dangers of drugs. They do now.
It doesn't sound like you're actually looking for an answer to what could be improved. It sounds like you use the product or one like it so because it's convenient for you you don't care about the inconvenience or danger to anyone else. That's pretty callous.
What should have been done to start with. They shouldn't have launched a product (neither should tile or the others) that had the potential to be used this way without significant protections in place. They didn't even protect their own users at launch.
I'm not really sure what you're arguing here. That they've done enough? That they shouldn't be liable for the damage their products have done? That they aren't violating people's privacy and potentially their safety by continuing to sell these items? If this were a car manufacturer and someone had died because of a feature of the car there would be a whole recall.
But they have added protection features, unlike virtually every other option. Yet they are the ones being sued? It does not seem fair.
Their protection features did not go nearly far enough and were far too restricted to only apple users. I don't see why apple shouldn't have to be punished for causing harm just because others are too small to notice.
Yeah, this type of tech is way more accessible than it was before, which isn't the problem. It's that Apple has not done enough to provide safety to users from airtags if they aren't using an Apple product. This isn't one of those techs that should be gated behind a walled garden because of the potential consequences to unsuspecting targets.
Apple needs to break from their usual walled garden approach when it comes to their tracking technology.
Top tip, if you start a discussion point with "what about", you should check it for whatsboutisms that aren't helpful to the discussion.
In this case those aren't relevant, those products did not have a blisteringly widescale advertising and marketing budget around them advertising how you can use the greatest tracking network ever created by the world's top engineers so you can track anything you want
You do realise that something being widespread doesn’t really matter here.
If a stalker wants to stalk people then they’re going to find the tech to do it, whether that be an Amazon tracker or an AirPod.
Do you actually believe that since Apple released AirTags that regular people thought yes I can finally stalk people now.
I can’t work out if your take is just based on naivety or just bashing Apple because it’s in vogue to do that.
There are plenty of things that Apple are actually responsible for that you can call them out on. You know like using cheap labour at Foxconn, their greenwashing of their reputation, there stranglehold on their OS with terms of targeted ads, their pricing, etc. AirTags is such a none issue that you take away from the actual shitty stuff they do.
That’s from someone who owns an iPhone and used to work for them. Give it some thought and let me know your thoughts.
AirTags notify people that they’re in the vicinity. That same marketing campaign also shared that iPhones tell you and that there’s an app for Android to detect them. You can’t have your cake and get to eat it too.
Would the problem be solvable by saying Google needs to break from their approach (do nothing, in this case), and work with Apple to incorporate Apple’s tech into Android by default?
Just trying to think through the finger pointing that happens as we reel in tech.
Google already did this.
However, the onus to mitigate problems created by one company shouldn't be their on competitors.
Apple launched AirTags alone, leveraging its massive Find My network, in order to have an immense advantage in the market, and this helped Apple rake in millions and millions of dollars.
It could have coordinated with Google even before the AirTag launch, but this would have probably resulted in missing out on millions in profits. So Apple chose profits over mitigating ethical and moral concerns, and only fixed problems a long time after it started selling the product to customers.
You’re making some big assumptions. That’s ok, though.
I appreciate the link.
I can sleep knowing Android friends have built-in safety measures, just as I do on an iPhone.