From out of the blue, an alert pops up on your phone which reads “AirTag found moving with you”. What does that mean? Are you being tracked? And what should you do?
That’s exactly what happened to a Roanoke area woman, who asked not to be identified by name due to the nature of the incident, “We had left the mall at about five-thirtyish and come home. We were sitting down to dinner and I got an alert on my phone that an unidentified AirTag was detected.”
Receiving the alert was unnerving and left her rattled and at a loss for what to do.
She recalls, “It was terrifying.”
AirTags are disk-shaped, lightweight, and measure about an inch-and-a-quarter in diameter. They were designed to help owners keep track of important or often misplaced items such as car keys, luggage, or even an umbrella. Unfortunately, the relatively inexpensive tags have become tools of stalkers, who have discovered they can also be used to track people.
France Belanger and Donna Wertalik are professors at Virginia Tech and co-hosts of “Voices of Privacy” on YouTube.
Belanger explains the basic function of the device, “The person who places the tag has notifications on their phone and they can figure out where the tag is at all times.”
Wertalik points out the downside of the device, “All of these apps started out genuinely to do the right thing: to track, to help us. And with everything good, some evil does come.”
AirTags are not the only such devices on the market. Tile Pro and the Galaxy Smart Tag are similar, but Apple’s product utilizes its “Find My” network which can essentially extend its range to be tracked over miles instead of several hundred feet.
Belanger highlights the accuracy of the AirTag, “The ultra-wide band, for example, gives a very precise location of this device.”
Wertalik and Belanger say keeping a cool head if you receive an alert is key.
Belanger offers specifics, “I would start by trying to figure out where is that tag. And if you have reasons to believe that this is a stalking situation, I would actually go to law enforcement.”
Officer Greg Benton, Crime Prevention Coordinator for Roanoke County Police, goes further on how you should react, “As soon as you get the notification, just stop what you’re doing. Think about your last couple of steps that you’ve been through so that can narrow down where might the device be at. If you’re out and about, make sure you go to a safe location. Or you’re more than welcome to the police department where we can give you a safe area to search the car and hang out with you to make sure that no one does come up near you while you’re trying to search.”
If you do find the tag, websites provide instructions for deactivating them.
Benton notes, “Companies like Apple or Samsung or Tile or any of those other companies are putting in their own countermeasures to make it more difficult to use them for nefarious reasons.”
Keeping up with all the latest gadgetry can prove difficult -- even for those who make it their business.
“What we always say is that you really need to be vigilant,” Wertalik begins.
Belanger adds, “We do this all the time. It’s part of our job. We consider ourselves aware. So, imagine people who are not in the world of privacy. So, that’s the whole purpose of what we’re trying to do. Let’s make sure everybody is educated. We’re not saying don’t use any of these devices. We’re just saying understand all of the challenges that come with that and what you can do.”
Resources such as “Voices of Privacy” can help in keeping up with our ever-changing world of technology.
