It was a matter of time before Apple broke its silence. In recent weeks, mainly American media have echoed the misuse of Apple’s small Bluetooth beacons. The Cupertino giant therefore made it clear that “AirTag was designed to help people know where their belongings are, not to track other people or property. ». He also wished to recall that ” instances of AirTag misuse are rare”while acknowledging that “every case is one too many. »
Apple therefore reminds that activated AirTags being associated with an Apple ID, it is possible for it to “provide information about the linked account in the event of a valid subpoena or request from the police force”. The American giant is also pleased that this collaboration with the police “is proving successful, since the information we have transmitted has made it possible on several occasions to trace the perpetrator of an offense, to arrest and charge him ».
In other words, thieves or stalkers are not in a situation of total impunity if their AirTags are detected and provided to the police as part of a complaint.
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But Apple also intends to improve prevention and avoid crises. It all starts with an educational effort and new privacy alerts while setting up an AirTag. It will thus be clearly explained that Apple tags cannot be used to track someone without their consent, which is generally a crime.
In addition, updates that will be deployed later this year will introduce four important changes.
- The first is precision localization. When an alert warns a user that he is being followed by an unknown AirTag, it will be possible to locate him precisely. The iPhone 11, 12 and 13 will thus indicate the direction and distance where the spy tag is located.
Like the localization function near an AirTag of which you are the owner, ” as the iPhone user moves around, this feature will aggregate data from the camera, ARKit, accelerometer, and gyroscope, and guide them to the AirTag using audible, haptic and visual signals”explains Apple. - The second modification concerns visual and audible alerts. Everything will start with a sound played by the AirTag which will alert the user followed by its presence. Since some bad guys are bypassing the speakers of AirTags so that they no longer emit sound, Apple will also make a location message appear on the iPhone, iPad or iPod touch of the tracked user.
- The third point concerns the “tracking alert logic”. On this point, Apple plans to ensure that users are warned earlier that they are being tracked, either by an AirTag or by another accessory unknown to the Locate network (even if we do not imagine thieves hiding an iPad Pro under a car to steal it afterwards).
- Finally, fourth and last point, the “AirTag Tone Modulation”. In this case, it will be a matter of ensuring that the sound produced by the beacons is louder, and therefore easier to spot.
To avoid unnecessary panic attacks, Apple also announced that it will fix a bug that caused AirPods Pro, Max, or third generation to trigger alerts that indicated that the user was being tracked by an unidentified accessory. After the patch, Apple’s headphones will decline their identity, to avoid unnecessary fear.
All of these measures are obviously positive, and show that Apple takes these minority but harmful uses of its AirTags seriously. iPhone, iPad and iPod users can therefore rejoice that their privacy will be more difficult to infringe. However, a great absentee remains in these declarations: Android.
Apple introduced Tracker Detect, an application for Google’s operating system, last December – it detects AirTags. However, users must make the effort to install it and think about launching it for it to be truly effective. We’ve contacted Apple about this and will update this article based on their response.
Source: Apple