Ok as a combat vet and experience with tracking down enemies over in foreign countries, always having a back up way to track ur item. Putting two devices in ur sensitive item would be ideal. Have one with the speaker attached so they could find that one and have the other with the speaker removed. Leave the one with the speaker, easy to be located so they don’t easily find the quite one by mistake and they will dispose of the easy one and carry on about their business. Most criminals won’t look or check for a second one.
@@jeanmartin6410 boomer that has no idea how technology works lol. Instead of 1 notification, AirTag is following you, now 2?! Lol then boomer suggest 3,4…
As a fellow combat veteran, whom deployed to Iraq three times and Afghanistan once, I'm just here to inform you how stating "as a combat veteran" just makes you sound like a dip-shit.
On a trip a few months ago my Airtag told me my bag had been left behind the flight after the airline personnel had messed up my reservation. I showed my phone's "find my..." app to the airline baggage agent; they did a deeper search on their computer and found it was on a later flight. I picked up the bag the next day and the airline gave me a flight voucher for my trouble. The tags paid for themselves.
Influencers' enthusiastic promotion of Apple's new AirTags, despite the technology's potential to track and collect data on users' location and habits, is really concerning. I rather not use them.
@@greglist2991 Please tell me that you don't think that the NSA having a room at AT&T where all the cables go through is completely benign. The problem with this sort of thing is that it's of no interest to anybody else, until it is. And there's no telling why they may ultimately decide that they're interested in you. You may not even be notified of it ever.
100% worth buying airtags! Had my welding helmet bag stolen from my welding truck, the bag was valued at $3k, long story short I found the thieves house, called the police, and got my bag back! They are worth every penny
@@gregoryblanche8390 yeah! I was very surprised but the RCMP actually acted and helped. The thieves ended up damaging 7 vehicles in my neighbourhood, and their house was full of stolen stuff
Just did this after picking up a 4 pack. Apple has changed the internal design and glued the device shut, there isn't a way to open the AirTag without breaking the tabs. Also, the speaker isn't adhered to the plastic part that comes out, it is glued into the center of the other smarts of the device. The speaker is still disabled but the tag no longer holds itself together. I'm going to toss it into some type of case to keep the battery connected. Just an FYI to anyone attempting this after March of 2023.
Honestly the biggest problem i find with airtags is you cant family share them. we use them for the appletv remotes and car keys things that are shared. Its damn annoying not being able to see my wife's tags or her being able to see mine.
exactly. 99.9% are being punished because 0.1% are being bad actors. apple is worried about abuse of the tags even inside a family (husband / wife tracking the other without knowledge etc.)
For the Airtag Vault, and anything that uses adhesive make sure to clear the area well with rubbing alcohol to ensure a clean area that will get the best adhesion, also pressure and friction. Sometimes i might heat up the adhesive area with a hairdryer before hand to get a more permanent stick. Some helpful tips.
Just use two AirTags, one with noise, one without. The thief finds the noisy one, tosses it, then disables the message he was getting which disables the other one too because he will probably cancel the notice when the alert pops up one more time. Hence disabling the second device notice too. You can then continue tracking the thief.
"he will probably cancel the notice when the alert pops up one more time" how can you be so sure what a thief may do? you don't know. and besides, the second airtag WILL continue to generate alert popups on the thief's iPhone because every airtag has a unique ID embedded in the device's hardware. cancelling alerts for the beeping airtag will NOT cancel alerts for the other airtag with its speaker removed.
AirTags saved my trip to Ireland last year during the time when international airports were having major issues with not enough staff. Some people were without luggage for weeks. I had AirTags in all of our bags including my bicycle travel case. The bike missed our connection fight and was left behind in London. I knew that immediately because while boarding for Dublin I could tell that one case was not on the plane, and as soon as s I arrived in Dublin I filed for the lost bag. Shortly after leaving the airport I saw on my phone that the bag had just made to Dublin, so I returned to the airport and informed the baggage claim rep that I was tracking my bag and I that it was in the airport Sure enough they went to check and it was there… however they had no idea where my bag was. The baggage claim representative told me that had I not had an AirTag in the case it could have been weeks before I’d gotten my bag. AirTag may not be perfect but it works!
Yes, they are very good at stalking your luggages and other valuables. I use them predominantly to locate where my items are (beep my wallet, beep my keys) that don’t have an Apple Find Me function (like beep my iPad). If someone stole something of mine, I didn’t think I would find it using this or similar tech - unless I left it behind in a restaurant or some place where the Good Samaritan is trying to get the thing back to me but unable to contact me otherwise. I do use it to stalk my daughter who keeps losing her wallet. If she does, she will call me to beep it, or I can track her down when I need to. She knows I have this superpower and when she is a teen, she will probably leave her wallet behind when she needs to sneak off 😂
Don't pop the speaker off. Just put a tiny piece of saran wrap to block speaker contacts, to disable speaker. Then it's reversible when you want to restore it.
Judging by the wire coil seen at 6:57 what he removed was the speaker driver. The Speakers voice coil (copper winding) is still in there so technically if he wanted to he can put the driver back in by gluing back in and assuming he got it in the right spot the speaker will work again.
This is awesome! An airtag helped recover my 16k motorcycle some months back and the thief seemed to not have found the tag by pure luck. I will certainly add an additional ninja tag to the bike (as the sound of the OG tag did actually help localize the bike once we where on location) Super simple hack. Appreciate the video! For those that want to go even crazier: There is an open source project to flash the airtags (or any other tag for that matter) to piggyback on the airtag network to create actually 100% stealth airtags that also send no notification to the tracked person. Of course: This is to track YOUR stuff and not to stalk someone, so use this with some good judgement!
@@lisunovroman There's a github project about it, the OpenHaystack project, but it's somewhat unhelpful. You need to know enough python to be able to write your own script to generate private keys, and you need to construct your own device. So it's not as simple as the above method. That said, if you have the time and are willing to devote the effort to it, you can make a "stealth" tracker that uses the Apple "Find My" network to track it. The item it's based on is a good bit bigger than an AirTag though. The base computer board is a micro:bit, and it looks like they retail for about $20 USD as of the time of writing.
I have a couple problems with this video. First is that "Help a Friend" allows you to find other people's AirTags with your iPhone. Second is that you should receive a notification if your AirTag is "Left Behind" (stolen and removed from your immediate vicinity) at which point you'd probably enable Lost Mode (which *should* disable the "stalker notification" to the thief).
Put one of these in my checked bag on an international flight. Didn't see the bag on the belt at all, even though Find my was telling me it was there. I sought help from Baggage Claim personnel and we walked around searching. Then noticed it literally tracks its proximity to you on the phone so you can walk rigjt to it. We found the bag and it was hidden behind another right next to it. A good laugh had by all - at my expense - but this thing realy was useful. 😅😅😅
I thought about doing this and then I realised police here in the UK don't actually do anything even if you tell them the exact coordinates of the thief's house and provide CCTV footage of the theft.
Simple solution to that is to say "I know where they are, and I'm about to blow their heads off so you better send someone". They'll be there in a flash, meanwhile you're still sitting at home.
@@ericrichardson3332 just make sure to tell them they are conservative and republicant's maybe throw in a little maga and they will throw the book at them. however if you say they have a D in front of their name it will be ignored by the Fbi DOJ and everyone in between. just my 2 Cents
There are Airtag holders that screw into dog collars. What you can do is instead use that Airtag holder to screw into your luggage or backpacks. That will help secure the Airtag to your luggage incase someone steals it or whatever and rummages around through it. And if they do find the Airtag, they'd need a torx driver to unscrew it to remove it from the bag.
I just did this with a new AirTag purchased march 3rd 2024. The speaker was locked down inside the middle of the electronics (instead of attached to the plastic in the video). I could still pry it up. Put everything together and the tag worked perfectly.. without the sound! Thanks again for the great video explaining how to open and put together. This AirTag is going on my expensive bike.
All you had to do was remove that white circle on top of the speaker which is magnetic. Didn’t have to peel off the speaker. That way you can put the magnet back if you wanted to bring the sound back
You must've won the lottery that day. Probably picked your name out of a truckload of names, said "we'll do this one, and we're done for the day." And they didn't mean them, they meant the whole division.
I can confirm it still works for new AirTags. People say they're glued now or don't work without the magnet. Nope. Works just like in your vid. Thanks, great job.
just picked up a 4 pack and tried it one of them, the speaker is now glued inside the tag itself ( not on the 3 tabbed door that’s pried open as shown in vid ) however it’s fairly simply to remove the speaker still then attach everything back together. tag still works after everything
For anyone wondering this still works, however the speaker is glued to the base instead of the cover that’s pryed off, just pop a razor blade underneath and pry it off.
My friend had an airtag hidden in her car by someone (still unknown) for months, she would have the notifications pop up saying shes been followed via the air tag whenever she drives. She ended up selling the car before she was ever able to find it. stay safe out there yall
You have to be somewhere where there is not too much noise so you can hear the sound. And think about where on your car is accessible from outside the car unless you suspect it was placed by someone that was inside your car.
Actually it is possible to create an AirTag clone tracker which will be not detectable by phones automatically (iPhone will not notify you). So it there are significant demand it is possible to start manufacturing.
This is great! I keep an AirTag in my car in case of one of two things, either I forget where I park, or someone steals my car. The only issue is sometimes when I get into the car the chime is automatically going off, which can get very annoying. First thing I’m doing tomorrow is removing that damned chime!
Just FYI, you may not want to do this if you're using an older iPhone without precision tracking ability (pre U1 chip). Without the chirping sound, it may make it harder to locate the item.
this answers a question I had about the other way an AirTag might direct a thief to the location of the device. the thieves i hope to thwart by removing the speaker now that I know how are homeless dilapidated RV fentanyl addicts who relentlessly steal everything in my neighborhood, including cars. they are less likely to have pre-U1 chip phones so i’m like 👌😎
Remember you are doing this only to protect something from being stolen, not lost. I keep an airtag in my car, you will never need to use the sound to locate your car once your in the Immediate vicinity. Another workaround that I do is for my toolbag I hide TWO airtags, one that sort of easy to find and one that's not, so when a crook gets the alert and finds and disables one and thinks they are in the clear, there is another one. The notification wont say there are TWO airtags following you. Now of course sooner or later the crook will get another notification but hopefully by that time I'm standing outside his door with either the cops or some people that he wishes were the cops if you know what I mean.
For most people, going on your own to try and track a stolen item to the thief is probably a fabulously bad idea, in any event. Also, even if you remove the speaker, a thief could still scan for airtags and find it that way, or at least know that one is present to look for, and really, that's a good as found.
"that's a good as found" Not necessarily. That really depends on how clever you are in hiding the device and how motivated the thief is, and whether you can retrieve your possession faster than they can find the AirTag.
In NYC with stacked buildings, it's nearly impossible to locate something stolen. But I did enjoy and appreciate you taking time to share. I use my tags to save me from myself e.g. losing my keys.
if your iphone can utilize the u1 chip then you can get the green arrow and it'll point you to the location then just find the room # and call the police to meet you there. iphone 13 and 14 have this feature. no idea how far back in series has it.
because it's easy to uproot your whole life and family versus getting an updated airtag and iPhone... find a place, get a new job, take the kids out of school, all really easy.
@@Raphmatic5000 cities have been getting worse for years. My best friend grew up in Harlem. He left 15 years ago and did so much better without the insane rent along with the high crime. He has been convincing his parents to move. My family left the city 20 years ago. When I go back it’s clear that was the correct decision.
I’ve been using Tile. As soon as they added replaceable batteries I upgraded because I appreciated that move. Hated throwing out the non serviceable early model.
The main problem with Tile is that it's only detected by phones with the tile app. Unfortunately, Google's foray into bluetooth beacons was ended unceremoniously.
@@chaos.corner I use my Tile for my tool bags while working. If I’m in an office building and running cables between floors and some stupid face sees my bag while I’m around a corner and picks it up. It’s happened once but they genuinely were keeping it safe in their office. Other times it’s my glare that keeps them away. But for the amount invested in my tools it’s peace of mind.
@@FearsomeWarrior Yeah. I have several tiles and I quite like them. They don't get picked up by random other phones that often though and I wish they were a bit cheaper.
My airtag suddenly started beeping late at night while on my dresser. "WTF?" I thought. "Why is it doing that?". It occurred to me that the neighbor I share a wall with probably got an alert on their phone that an Airtag may be following them. Because they're on the other side of the wall. Good job Apple. Some people live in apartments.
They should make an update to the AirTags where the owner of the AirTag can disable the chime/tone for any device that it is not registered to. For instance only my phone can disable the chime for specific AirTags and if something is stolen, the thief gets notified but can’t use the chime, and if I find the location of the thief, I can enable the chime and make it go off.
@@Kingkilla0127 and the first time a stalker uses this method to silence the AirTag Apple will make it so if you remove the speaker the AirTag quits working altogether, and that’s of they don’t do it sooner if this catches on.
Air Tags were cool to have in our luggage when we traveled internationally a few months ago. Another couple on our trip wished they had them in their bags which were not located for 2 weeks…on the last day of the trip. Though frequent travelers, they allowed the airline to put their carry on bags in the hold. All they had for 2 weeks were the clothes they were wearing and some they had to buy on the trip. No clothes or underwear - no makeup - no toiletries.
Had a flight come into my station, 170/175 so a full size forward and aft bin. Well the station it came from forgot to check the aft bin(required due to pets/dry ice). There were 23 bags that had been left in the bin and came to my station. This is bad not only from a passenger standpoint, but really really bad for pilots. They need to know the weight and balance of everything put on the aircraft to know where to set wing angle and landing/takeoff variables. If something is off too far to one side or the other the plane can crash. It's also a fine on the airline. If passengers knew half the crap we had to put up with to get them to their destination then they would just drive.
@@rampagent9226 we know all the crap you go through but we don't care because we are paying for it and you're making living out of it. Stop pretending like you're doing us a favour.
Someone close to me has been being stalked and has had their devices hacked and identity stolen. I've seen other videos that show the notification takes too long if it notifies at all. Its believed its someone in their apartment complex. Its good to know that searching for tags is best done by physical search instead of relying on the sound or notification.
FYI, when I opened mine, the speaker stayed attached to the back white portion instead of coming off with the gray cover like this video. If you just push the center of the rounded white cover, it’s easy to pop the speaker out. Hope that helps anyone who has that happen.
I tried putting an airtag on my dog's collar. But because Airtags can't be shared with family, whenever my wife would take our dog someplace the thing would start beeping which really freaked him out. So I am definitely going to remove the speaker on his right away. Thanks for this video
Same for use Jeff! I’ve got one on my dog and when we were out of town, our house sitter told me that it would randomly beep and freak out my dog. Speaker removed👍
So...what was the purpose of releasing air tags, as security devices, when someone with an iPhone can simply load an app, and find it? So you hide an air tag on your bike, so you can find it if it gets stolen, thief scans your bike with his phone, finds your ai tag, and removes it, then rides away on your bike. You're spending money for no protection. Apple should be sued for this.
You convinced me to finally do this to 2 of my tags. The 2 I got on my cats can stay for legit stalking. But my escooter & brand new esk8board can do without a beeping.
Remember that airtags will also make a sound if disconnected from their owner's iphone for a few days and then moved. That may make your cats very uncomfortable, I know the sound made my dog uncomfortable, so I went ahead and removed the speaker on its airtag.
This is why I use BOTH an Apple AirTag and Samsung SmartTag on some things. I hide them in different places, and if a thief is notified and finds one, they will think they "found it" and they will probably quit looking and not find the other.
You don't have to destroy the airtag. Just pack the airtag in a latex glove and tape it several times with some acoustic foam. Noone will hear it I promise. I tried I cannot hear a damn thing.
Thanks so much for this video! I feel better knowing that a thief won’t easily be able to find the AirTag now that I have removed the speaker. BTW, I broke all three tabs prying it open and I didn’t need to glue it back together. It locked back in place just fine. 😊
We have them in all our travel bags, cars, trailers etc. It is anoying when the wife takes my car or uses my bag for a vaction or the kids take school trip etc. Apple needs a family plan for the air tags too.
Keep a cheap iPhone constantly plugged in (se or 8s or higher) in your car that stop the anti stalker feature from activating (I use samsung so when I forgot to replug the iPhone back in it sets off my Samsung phone that my own tags are following me) I the uk we have a 3uk sim that gives you 150mb every month for free
How easy it has become for someone who knows someone's an android user, can stalk that person at all times without worrying they would ever get notified about it.
welcome, you actually nailed the way stalkers and thiefs actually use the airtags, if he cant find it, you wont find it either when a bad actor is following you specially when they are trying to get your car and its attached to the chassis somewhere...
But you'll at least know it's there👍 In the theft scenario, hopefully the thief can't find it and ditches your bag/item because they now know they're being tracked
i was literally just trying to figure this out last week. i have an airtag attached to my bike incase someone steals it. The airtag is well hidden but then when the bike is moved it makes the chiming noise defeating the purpose of hiding the airtag and also alerting the potential thief that there is an airtag on my bike. I posted to reddit asking if there was a way to disable the chime sound and everyone said no, apple put the chime sound on it so people will know if someone slipped it into their bag or something to track them. As you said Apple's main purpose of the airtag is to track an item you've lost it is not intended to be a tracking device for stolen objects. I am going to be doing this little hack immediately to the airtag on my bike.
I have an airtag hidden in my truck and sometimes it chimes, for no apparent reason, as I get in the truck giving away the approximate location and I would imagine also using some of the energy in the battery. I will be doing this mod as soon as I get back home.
@@wayneberry3453 Thieving junkies know every trick in the book . Whatever you think you know they know much more , trust me . But hey maybe the person who steals your stuff is like new the game or something , you never know . =P
@@SabbaticusRex bahahahaha yeh. Junkies are usually reeeeeally smart. Lets just start leaving things unlocked and just hand it to them. 🤷♂️. My stuff doesnt get stolen. Guess i know more than your "genius" junkies bahahaaha
Things that never happened: Print guy suggesting to go for lower quality shirts to bring costs down - Lying to seem like a swell guy only to earn more money, such a good human
When apple notifies you that you are being tracked by one of their devices it should have a popup to give you the option for getting directions to or to call the nearest police station. If you get to the police station and the tracker is still with you then you can start to more safely search your vehicle
While youve got the Tag apart - any way to hook it up to an alternative power source? Maybe hardwire it into the cars electrical somewhere so you dont have to worry about the battery running out of juice or whatever
They need to have a way to set up a enterprise or family account. That would help secure an inventory of valuables be a team. As you probably know, this is done by companies already when they send laptops and tablets to employees, plus other stuff.
Thanks for another great video! I'm wondering if the "tag vault", is capable of being sound proof for the air tag? If so, then a person wouldn't have to worry about possibly damaging the air tag when attempting to remove the speaker. Just a thought.
You could sew the airtag between 2 pieces of fabric to make it built into your bag or even in a car seat than it will be unfindable when paired with the silenced airtag
Or if you know where your stolen item is. They don't give a shit. Theft is almost legal in lots of places. You need to hire some people to get it back for you. Like a off duty cop. Fn sad man
***FOR EVERYONE CONCERNED ABOUT STALKING, AirTags are actually terrible for stalking people. You have to register an AirTag to your Apple ID to activate it, then Apple alerts the person if one is following them. The authorities can then find the AirTag and the person associated with the Apple ID. Terrible for stalking, but great if stalkers do use them because they'll easily be caught. But for the 99.99% of other users out there with good intentions, this makes AirTags a whole lot better👍
You forgot to adress what to do once you’ve found the location of the theif. The police won’t have the time and resources to help you, so it’s either up to you to go confront someone or do nothing. If people start confronting criminals because of this mod, eventually someone is going to get killed. So maybe not such a ”good human” thing to do after all when you consider the real world consequences :/ :(
@@beaconofwierd1883 These were never intended to be an anti-theft device, that's just a side effect of their functionality. And no the police probably don't care about your stolen camera bag, but your car, yes they will help if you can say "hey I can see where it's located" But if you are on vacation and something is stolen from your room and you can see that it's in another room or in some employee area or an employees home then the hotel may assist. It's only $29, I'm sure whatever you had for lunch today costs more.
Thank you for the video! Great tip! I use tiles as well to track my car as a backup. Tiles do not send a beep so you don't have to do this but Tiles do not have as many users as AirTags do so there is that.
Thank you for this lesson!! I had thought about getting a few airtags for things like my cat if he got out o r lost, my suv, (Hey, free LoJack!), my luggage when I travel etc..but I never thought that the crook would be alerted to it and then hear it! I could easily sew it into a suitcase and with the sound speaker removed keep it hidden somehat well!! Thank you !!
As per the sales pitch for your "BE A GOOD HUMAN" shirts at the intro here while talking about the beneficial, as well as malicious, uses of Apple's Air Tags and their ability to track objects as well as people, you mentioned that they would be good "stocking stuffers" this Christmas season. Or did you mean stalking stuffers?
Well it’s pretty useful to remove the speaker but on another iPhone or apple device you can just select that AirTag that has been placed on an object and select the option of stop tracking and that’s it, just disarm the airtag from another device, I say this from experience that happened to my sister on a eurotrip.
Fantastic Video David. I was looking for a way to keep track of my Legacy 3.6R in the event that it is stolen. Subaru has the ability to track for me, but at a cost of $149 per year. This helped so much. You are indeed a good human brother. I will be purchasing one of your awesome shirts as well. Keep the GOOD ENERGY flowing. Cheers! -Eddie D., Chicago, Illinois
The secret to fool the thief would be to plant two airtags in the bag, one with sound (planted in a more obvious place) and one without (hidden in the lining or somewhere more obscure). When they were alerted that there was an air tag they would find the more obvious one with sound and then assume that they had found the one. Should the alert keep going off from the other one they would probably assume that it was from the first one (the one with sound) since they are in the same area.
I wonder if they receive 2 distinct notifications about an AirTag following them, or if the notification says there’s 2 AirTags following them..? I used two AirTags when I was flying with my golf clubs. One in an obvious place and the other much more hidden. I had never heard about taking the speaker out before. That is a great idea to have one with sound and one silent. As long as it doesn’t specifically alert the thief that there’s two AirTags following them.
Too bad criminals are using these to track a person's car or a person. Just stick the airtag on a car or drop it in someone's pocket or purse, then follow them home... So terrible.
They should add the stole item mode where you can't track the item anymore (thus preventing stalking) while it doesn't inform its existence amymore to the people around it. Instead it sends the report to officers.
@@rohansampat1995 sounds like a great idea to me. I would love to have the police go find my stolen stuff. I have an air tag on my $8,000 bike, camera equipment bag with $10,000 in equipment and my laptop bag. Have no reason to hide these from the police. But I don't they'd be willing to go on that goose chase.
Bahahaha AAAAAAAAHAHAHAHA yeh. By the time the report is adhered to, the item is in the hockshop, bought 10 times... and 30 years have gone by. Im friends with a few police officers and i bag the absolute sh@$ out of them for things like this lol
Coolest hiding place I’ve seen is a camera body cap that had something like that vault built into it. Even if someone just grabs the camera out of a case, the air tag goes with it.
if you leave the coil in there, if the airtag was touching a magnet or anything magnetic, it would still beep but will only be heard in a completely quiet room.
This is awesome. The next time I replace the batteries in all my vehicles and bags, I’ll have to remove the speakers. Those cases are also pretty cool. I feel like the stalker update only harms law abiding citizens. There’s probably 10,000 thefts to every stalker.
This seems like a good idea! But this doesn't completely solve the problem of a thieve disabling it. Because precision finding will still screw you over even without the speaker inside.
Well good news, the prompt for seeing if an AirTag is tracking you doesn't allow precision finding, so the thief won't be able to find it still. The problem, however, is if a stalker stumbles on this video and utilizes this hack to find where people live. If people can't find it, it'll be too late when they do.
@@LVessell Not tying to argue, but on Apple’s website it specifically says this: “We’re also investigating a series of updates that we plan to introduce later this year, including: Precision Finding: This capability allows recipients of an unwanted tracking alert to locate an unknown AirTag with precision. iPhone 11, iPhone 12, and iPhone 13 users will be able to use Precision Finding to see the distance and direction to an unknown AirTag when it is in range.” So much for just disabling the speaker.
@@shawndavismedia I was just thinking this. If Apple is set on not allowing the AirTags to stealthily track anyone there’s no way in hell ppl will beat Apple with a lil DIY. I could also see them straight up disabling AirTags that have been tampered with or are ”functioning incorrectly” in the future.
Every air tag thread I come across there is always some joker reminding the entire internet that apple "never intend airtags to be anti theft devices" yessssss... WE KNOW. You are not teaching anyone anything with your words.
AirTag came to the rescue last week when my Kindergartener mistakenly got on the bus when no one was able to be home. Fortunately, I was alerted that her backpack was on the move and was able to meet the bus at the intermediate school and tell the principal at that school she was there.
Thanks for mentioning that Airtag was designed for things such as finding lost items. Somehow, people came to believe it was created to find stolen items. It wasn't!! If you have something that was stolen, and you were able to use an Airtag, Tile, or Samsung Smart Tag to find it, great, but that's not what they were originally designed for.
@@anlumo1 I wouldn’t say so exactly. AirTags are small enough to fit into a bag of practically any size from a book bag, a camera bag to one of those tiny coin type bags. A busy/side tracked person or more commonly children can put the bag down get roped into other adventures before realizing they left it behind. A person can then track the AirTag instead of trying to remember every location they been that it where it might be. Would note as one of those things where it’s easy to look at and think you couldn’t possibly lose track of something until the day comes where you do and wish you had a way to recover it easier.
I’ve seen so many videos on this 6-12 months ago. Basically this exact video. You basically redid a bunch of other peoples content so you really didn’t scour the depths of Reddit, you simply just watched someone else’s and did it yourself, that’s how you knew where “exactly” the tabs were.
Great selling for Android. TY... Seriously though great information thanks. Was curious about Air Tags and what the big thing is about them. Being Android user it is always good to checkup on what others are using these days. Great video. Super organized work space love it.
Owner of the airtag should have the option to mute the sound and enable the sound once you are in very close proximity of your airtag and you are in a safe environment. Otherwise wait for the police once you know the approximate location of you lost item. Apple airtag as most comments say, will not thwart stalkers since both the stalker and stalkee will be notified of the airtags and provided both parties are using iPhones or using a tracking device.
keep in mind the airtags give the location of the nearest device that detects them, not the actual location of the airtag. So in common use, its where you iphone with bluetooth is, but the airtag could be anywhere in range, but showing your iphone gps location. If you put it into missing mode, then the location of the gps of the iphone that detects it, which gives you a good idea, just not exact location. I think as an anti theft device in a car it would work as it would be detected where the car was taken to ... and only starts alerting about 24 hours later, which you could be able to location it before then. And not all thefts would have iphones.
Thanks for explaining the vital details to me, other comments have only given somewhat vague details, - 'I thought that there was more to the story' than others had told, glad you took the trouble to write.
Those who know how electricity works know that removing the speaker will cause high resistance on the circuit when there's nowhere for the power to go when it wants to beep. This is turn will dramatically reduce the lifespan of the airtag.
There is a much easier way involving attacking the 2 wires through your battery. I bought these after my neighbor got his truck stolen. If the carjacker gets notified and can beep it kind of defeats the purpose. Still gets notified potentially but is much harder to find.
Ok as a combat vet and experience with tracking down enemies over in foreign countries, always having a back up way to track ur item. Putting two devices in ur sensitive item would be ideal. Have one with the speaker attached so they could find that one and have the other with the speaker removed. Leave the one with the speaker, easy to be located so they don’t easily find the quite one by mistake and they will dispose of the easy one and carry on about their business. Most criminals won’t look or check for a second one.
That’s a great tip, thank you!
They will look for a second one now. But, good idea!
@@jeanmartin6410 boomer that has no idea how technology works lol. Instead of 1 notification, AirTag is following you, now 2?! Lol then boomer suggest 3,4…
@@greglist2991 that would be me!! Boomer for sure.
As a fellow combat veteran, whom deployed to Iraq three times and Afghanistan once, I'm just here to inform you how stating "as a combat veteran" just makes you sound like a dip-shit.
On a trip a few months ago my Airtag told me my bag had been left behind the flight after the airline personnel had messed up my reservation. I showed my phone's "find my..." app to the airline baggage agent; they did a deeper search on their computer and found it was on a later flight. I picked up the bag the next day and the airline gave me a flight voucher for my trouble. The tags paid for themselves.
Man, baggage might be one of the best use cases for AirTags!
Influencers' enthusiastic promotion of Apple's new AirTags, despite the technology's potential to track and collect data on users' location and habits, is really concerning. I rather not use them.
@@darma8159 lol boomer no idea how technology works. Why would Apple AirTag care to track you? Have iPhone, using FB, IG, TT, YT on same iPhone?
Same with my tag. I use Samsung one. I won't buy an iPhone only to have their tag after all.
@@greglist2991 Please tell me that you don't think that the NSA having a room at AT&T where all the cables go through is completely benign. The problem with this sort of thing is that it's of no interest to anybody else, until it is. And there's no telling why they may ultimately decide that they're interested in you. You may not even be notified of it ever.
100% worth buying airtags! Had my welding helmet bag stolen from my welding truck, the bag was valued at $3k, long story short I found the thieves house, called the police, and got my bag back! They are worth every penny
The police actually acted on your info? That’s great.
@@gregoryblanche8390 yeah! I was very surprised but the RCMP actually acted and helped. The thieves ended up damaging 7 vehicles in my neighbourhood, and their house was full of stolen stuff
Weld done 🤣
Genius
Why don’t people with cars without a gps use these for anti theft? Worth it, track your car instead of the waiting game
Just did this after picking up a 4 pack. Apple has changed the internal design and glued the device shut, there isn't a way to open the AirTag without breaking the tabs. Also, the speaker isn't adhered to the plastic part that comes out, it is glued into the center of the other smarts of the device. The speaker is still disabled but the tag no longer holds itself together. I'm going to toss it into some type of case to keep the battery connected. Just an FYI to anyone attempting this after March of 2023.
Should have seen this comment earlier, lol. You are correct.
rip
Do you mean the battery is no longer replaceable?
@@888cromartie battery replaceability stayed the same
Why in the he// would Apple do that? Oh wait, maybe so they can sell another future silent model.
Honestly the biggest problem i find with airtags is you cant family share them. we use them for the appletv remotes and car keys things that are shared. Its damn annoying not being able to see my wife's tags or her being able to see mine.
exactly. 99.9% are being punished because 0.1% are being bad actors. apple is worried about abuse of the tags even inside a family (husband / wife tracking the other without knowledge etc.)
@@canyonblue737-8 Weird, if I wanna stalk a family member I just see where their iPhone is... No need for an AirTag
Honestly how has apple not thought of this yet 💀
This is my biggest complaint as well! They for sure need to add in a Family Share feature so everyone in the family can use a single AirTag👍
@@canyonblue737-8 this makes no sense as you should be able to accept the share. That's trivial.
For the Airtag Vault, and anything that uses adhesive make sure to clear the area well with rubbing alcohol to ensure a clean area that will get the best adhesion, also pressure and friction. Sometimes i might heat up the adhesive area with a hairdryer before hand to get a more permanent stick. Some helpful tips.
Better yet to instead buy the one that attaches magnetically instead of with adhesive.
@@colt5189it’d better be made with rare earth magnets
Just use two AirTags, one with noise, one without. The thief finds the noisy one, tosses it, then disables the message he was getting which disables the other one too because he will probably cancel the notice when the alert pops up one more time. Hence disabling the second device notice too. You can then continue tracking the thief.
Why is this comment not top of the list
@@mrclaytontodd I agree. Thank you!
Oooo..I LOVE the way you think!!!👍
because someone made a similar comment about a year ago. great advice though and just common sense.@@mrclaytontodd
"he will probably cancel the notice when the alert pops up one more time"
how can you be so sure what a thief may do? you don't know. and besides, the second airtag WILL continue to generate alert popups on the thief's iPhone because every airtag has a unique ID embedded in the device's hardware. cancelling alerts for the beeping airtag will NOT cancel alerts for the other airtag with its speaker removed.
AirTags saved my trip to Ireland last year during the time when international airports were having major issues with not enough staff.
Some people were without luggage for weeks.
I had AirTags in all of our bags including my bicycle travel case.
The bike missed our connection fight and was left behind in London.
I knew that immediately because while boarding for Dublin I could tell that one case was not on the plane, and as soon as s I arrived in Dublin I filed for the lost bag.
Shortly after leaving the airport I saw on my phone that the bag had just made to Dublin, so I returned to the airport and informed the baggage claim rep that I was tracking my bag and I that it was in the airport
Sure enough they went to check and it was there… however they had no idea where my bag was.
The baggage claim representative told me that had I not had an AirTag in the case it could have been weeks before I’d gotten my bag.
AirTag may not be perfect but it works!
Yes, they are very good at stalking your luggages and other valuables. I use them predominantly to locate where my items are (beep my wallet, beep my keys) that don’t have an Apple Find Me function (like beep my iPad). If someone stole something of mine, I didn’t think I would find it using this or similar tech - unless I left it behind in a restaurant or some place where the Good Samaritan is trying to get the thing back to me but unable to contact me otherwise.
I do use it to stalk my daughter who keeps losing her wallet. If she does, she will call me to beep it, or I can track her down when I need to. She knows I have this superpower and when she is a teen, she will probably leave her wallet behind when she needs to sneak off 😂
Smart!!
And anyone with an iphone, on the plane that brought your luggage to ireland, would have been notified they're being stalked 😂
@KenFullman You made me laugh thinking about 100+ people on an airplane getting notified they're being followed by one airtag
I'm confused, they showed the bag as arrived in Dublin, but they couldn't tell you where it was? How were you able to find it?
Don't pop the speaker off. Just put a tiny piece of saran wrap to block speaker contacts, to disable speaker. Then it's reversible when you want to restore it.
Judging by the wire coil seen at 6:57 what he removed was the speaker driver. The Speakers voice coil (copper winding) is still in there so technically if he wanted to he can put the driver back in by gluing back in and assuming he got it in the right spot the speaker will work again.
You can just pop back the speaker thing back to where it was
Good idea. I should have read this before totally destroying one of mine.
Why i feel there is still little noise after removal of the speaker?
Any idea?
Thanks
I’m confused. Do you still open the tag???
This is awesome! An airtag helped recover my 16k motorcycle some months back and the thief seemed to not have found the tag by pure luck. I will certainly add an additional ninja tag to the bike (as the sound of the OG tag did actually help localize the bike once we where on location)
Super simple hack. Appreciate the video!
For those that want to go even crazier: There is an open source project to flash the airtags (or any other tag for that matter) to piggyback on the airtag network to create actually 100% stealth airtags that also send no notification to the tracked person. Of course: This is to track YOUR stuff and not to stalk someone, so use this with some good judgement!
Any info on how to find it? Would be very helpful to not notify the thief of the possibility of getting caught :)
@@lisunovroman There's a github project about it, the OpenHaystack project, but it's somewhat unhelpful. You need to know enough python to be able to write your own script to generate private keys, and you need to construct your own device. So it's not as simple as the above method. That said, if you have the time and are willing to devote the effort to it, you can make a "stealth" tracker that uses the Apple "Find My" network to track it. The item it's based on is a good bit bigger than an AirTag though. The base computer board is a micro:bit, and it looks like they retail for about $20 USD as of the time of writing.
I have a couple problems with this video. First is that "Help a Friend" allows you to find other people's AirTags with your iPhone. Second is that you should receive a notification if your AirTag is "Left Behind" (stolen and removed from your immediate vicinity) at which point you'd probably enable Lost Mode (which *should* disable the "stalker notification" to the thief).
I turned off "left behind" because I'd get a notification ever time I went into the store. i.e. via an Airtag hidden in the car.
Put one of these in my checked bag on an international flight. Didn't see the bag on the belt at all, even though Find my was telling me it was there. I sought help from Baggage Claim personnel and we walked around searching. Then noticed it literally tracks its proximity to you on the phone so you can walk rigjt to it. We found the bag and it was hidden behind another right next to it. A good laugh had by all - at my expense - but this thing realy was useful. 😅😅😅
I thought about doing this and then I realised police here in the UK don't actually do anything even if you tell them the exact coordinates of the thief's house and provide CCTV footage of the theft.
Well then you know what to do....
Tell them the thief just insulted your trans 'sister' on the internet or something and they will send a SWAT team and helicopter .
Same here it depends where you live in the U.S. sometimes they do their job and other times they don't
Simple solution to that is to say "I know where they are, and I'm about to blow their heads off so you better send someone". They'll be there in a flash, meanwhile you're still sitting at home.
@@ericrichardson3332 just make sure to tell them they are conservative and republicant's maybe throw in a little maga and they will throw the book at them. however if you say they have a D in front of their name it will be ignored by the Fbi DOJ and everyone in between. just my 2 Cents
There are Airtag holders that screw into dog collars. What you can do is instead use that Airtag holder to screw into your luggage or backpacks. That will help secure the Airtag to your luggage incase someone steals it or whatever and rummages around through it. And if they do find the Airtag, they'd need a torx driver to unscrew it to remove it from the bag.
I just did this with a new AirTag purchased march 3rd 2024. The speaker was locked down inside the middle of the electronics (instead of attached to the plastic in the video). I could still pry it up. Put everything together and the tag worked perfectly.. without the sound! Thanks again for the great video explaining how to open and put together. This AirTag is going on my expensive bike.
This is good advice, and I like the way you explain that it’s not antitheft, it’s more anti-stalking, or pro-locating.
All you had to do was remove that white circle on top of the speaker which is magnetic. Didn’t have to peel off the speaker. That way you can put the magnet back if you wanted to bring the sound back
He still has sound because he didn't remove the copper ring. Though the volume is a lot lower without the speaker.
My car was stolen a few months ago and because of Airtag, the police was able to track and recover my car in less than 3 hrs.
Awesome I got one on my car too
How?
You must've won the lottery that day. Probably picked your name out of a truckload of names, said "we'll do this one, and we're done for the day." And they didn't mean them, they meant the whole division.
I can confirm it still works for new AirTags. People say they're glued now or don't work without the magnet. Nope. Works just like in your vid. Thanks, great job.
I just bought a 4 pack today (16/8/24) and it is still exactly the same as the video.
just picked up a 4 pack and tried it one of them, the speaker is now glued inside the tag itself ( not on the 3 tabbed door that’s pried open as shown in vid ) however it’s fairly simply to remove the speaker still then attach everything back together. tag still works after everything
Good to know they switched it! Thanks!
Can confirm the same (16/8/24)
For anyone wondering this still works, however the speaker is glued to the base instead of the cover that’s pryed off, just pop a razor blade underneath and pry it off.
My friend had an airtag hidden in her car by someone (still unknown) for months, she would have the notifications pop up saying shes been followed via the air tag whenever she drives. She ended up selling the car before she was ever able to find it. stay safe out there yall
*brushes hands off* not my problem ANYMORE!!
Your friend is either doing drugs or is a dealer
You have to be somewhere where there is not too much noise so you can hear the sound. And think about where on your car is accessible from outside the car unless you suspect it was placed by someone that was inside your car.
Lemon car LOL!
we all know it was you YKTV, stop frontin
That's only half the problem. I don't want it to tell them there is an airtag with them or it defeats the purpose!
Actually it is possible to create an AirTag clone tracker which will be not detectable by phones automatically (iPhone will not notify you).
So it there are significant demand it is possible to start manufacturing.
This is great! I keep an AirTag in my car in case of one of two things, either I forget where I park, or someone steals my car. The only issue is sometimes when I get into the car the chime is automatically going off, which can get very annoying. First thing I’m doing tomorrow is removing that damned chime!
Just FYI, you may not want to do this if you're using an older iPhone without precision tracking ability (pre U1 chip). Without the chirping sound, it may make it harder to locate the item.
Solid FYI👍
this answers a question I had about the other way an AirTag might direct a thief to the location of the device. the thieves i hope to thwart by removing the speaker now that I know how are homeless dilapidated RV fentanyl addicts who relentlessly steal everything in my neighborhood, including cars. they are less likely to have pre-U1 chip phones so i’m like 👌😎
@@barnacleburrito3728 I don't think the directional tracking is a thing for non-owner phones.
Remember you are doing this only to protect something from being stolen, not lost. I keep an airtag in my car, you will never need to use the sound to locate your car once your in the Immediate vicinity. Another workaround that I do is for my toolbag I hide TWO airtags, one that sort of easy to find and one that's not, so when a crook gets the alert and finds and disables one and thinks they are in the clear, there is another one. The notification wont say there are TWO airtags following you. Now of course sooner or later the crook will get another notification but hopefully by that time I'm standing outside his door with either the cops or some people that he wishes were the cops if you know what I mean.
EXACTLY!
Apple™, the company which digitally stalks it's customers using thousands of data points is "anti-stalking". What a joke!
It's all about making the customer feel safe so you can continue to exploit them
For most people, going on your own to try and track a stolen item to the thief is probably a fabulously bad idea, in any event.
Also, even if you remove the speaker, a thief could still scan for airtags and find it that way, or at least know that one is present to look for, and really, that's a good as found.
"that's a good as found" Not necessarily. That really depends on how clever you are in hiding the device and how motivated the thief is, and whether you can retrieve your possession faster than they can find the AirTag.
In NYC with stacked buildings, it's nearly impossible to locate something stolen. But I did enjoy and appreciate you taking time to share. I use my tags to save me from myself e.g. losing my keys.
And even if you can point the apartment where your wallet is, there is probably no legal way to do a search.
if your iphone can utilize the u1 chip then you can get the green arrow and it'll point you to the location then just find the room # and call the police to meet you there. iphone 13 and 14 have this feature. no idea how far back in series has it.
That why we left the cities. The cities are pretty much shit holes now.
I would move away
because it's easy to uproot your whole life and family versus getting an updated airtag and iPhone... find a place, get a new job, take the kids out of school, all really easy.
@@Raphmatic5000 cities have been getting worse for years. My best friend grew up in Harlem.
He left 15 years ago and did so much better without the insane rent along with the high crime. He has been convincing his parents to move.
My family left the city 20 years ago. When I go back it’s clear that was the correct decision.
I’ve been using Tile. As soon as they added replaceable batteries I upgraded because I appreciated that move. Hated throwing out the non serviceable early model.
The main problem with Tile is that it's only detected by phones with the tile app. Unfortunately, Google's foray into bluetooth beacons was ended unceremoniously.
@@chaos.corner I use my Tile for my tool bags while working. If I’m in an office building and running cables between floors and some stupid face sees my bag while I’m around a corner and picks it up. It’s happened once but they genuinely were keeping it safe in their office. Other times it’s my glare that keeps them away. But for the amount invested in my tools it’s peace of mind.
@@FearsomeWarrior Yeah. I have several tiles and I quite like them. They don't get picked up by random other phones that often though and I wish they were a bit cheaper.
They NEVER notify when the battery is low, so they're always flat when I need them. Do not recommend.
@@dfgdfg_ mine do. Shows it in the menu.
"Oh no the video isn't quite long enough yet. Better repeat myself 4 times so I can get that cheddar".
But free to watch. You're welcome good sir👍
@@DavidManningvlog I do thank you for free to watch! 👌
My airtag suddenly started beeping late at night while on my dresser. "WTF?" I thought. "Why is it doing that?". It occurred to me that the neighbor I share a wall with probably got an alert on their phone that an Airtag may be following them. Because they're on the other side of the wall. Good job Apple. Some people live in apartments.
They should make an update to the AirTags where the owner of the AirTag can disable the chime/tone for any device that it is not registered to. For instance only my phone can disable the chime for specific AirTags and if something is stolen, the thief gets notified but can’t use the chime, and if I find the location of the thief, I can enable the chime and make it go off.
So, if a stranger air-tags your car... but you can't find it... then you're good with no chimes?
@@trevelian23 it’s the same with this video tho, removing the speaker.
@@Kingkilla0127 and the first time a stalker uses this method to silence the AirTag Apple will make it so if you remove the speaker the AirTag quits working altogether, and that’s of they don’t do it sooner if this catches on.
@@JCole78 Then this hack gets slightly (only slightly) more complicated by adding a resistor of the correct value in place of the speaker.
@@Kingkilla0127 They probably won't since doing so could land them in hot water if they add that feature and someone is killed by a stalker.
Air Tags were cool to have in our luggage when we traveled internationally a few months ago. Another couple on our trip wished they had them in their bags which were not located for 2 weeks…on the last day of the trip. Though frequent travelers, they allowed the airline to put their carry on bags in the hold. All they had for 2 weeks were the clothes they were wearing and some they had to buy on the trip. No clothes or underwear - no makeup - no toiletries.
😊
Golly … two whole weeks without their stuff ….. 14 days ….. traveling internationally ….
Must have been a near life threatening experience ……
Had a flight come into my station, 170/175 so a full size forward and aft bin. Well the station it came from forgot to check the aft bin(required due to pets/dry ice). There were 23 bags that had been left in the bin and came to my station. This is bad not only from a passenger standpoint, but really really bad for pilots. They need to know the weight and balance of everything put on the aircraft to know where to set wing angle and landing/takeoff variables. If something is off too far to one side or the other the plane can crash. It's also a fine on the airline.
If passengers knew half the crap we had to put up with to get them to their destination then they would just drive.
@@rampagent9226 we know all the crap you go through but we don't care because we are paying for it and you're making living out of it. Stop pretending like you're doing us a favour.
@@rampagent9226 on some flights it is maybe same time to drive to destination. And always comfortable.
Someone close to me has been being stalked and has had their devices hacked and identity stolen. I've seen other videos that show the notification takes too long if it notifies at all. Its believed its someone in their apartment complex. Its good to know that searching for tags is best done by physical search instead of relying on the sound or notification.
"SOME of you have bad intentions.....so i'm gonna show you how to...." LOL
FYI, when I opened mine, the speaker stayed attached to the back white portion instead of coming off with the gray cover like this video. If you just push the center of the rounded white cover, it’s easy to pop the speaker out. Hope that helps anyone who has that happen.
I didn't see a gray cover in this video. his speaker was attached to the white part too it seems.
I tried putting an airtag on my dog's collar. But because Airtags can't be shared with family, whenever my wife would take our dog someplace the thing would start beeping which really freaked him out. So I am definitely going to remove the speaker on his right away. Thanks for this video
Same for use Jeff! I’ve got one on my dog and when we were out of town, our house sitter told me that it would randomly beep and freak out my dog. Speaker removed👍
iOS 17 lets you share AirTags
Why would it start beeping if you weren't trying to find it?
Always mount a Samsung tag too. Double security and at least one of them won’t tell thief he is being tracked
So...what was the purpose of releasing air tags, as security devices, when someone with an iPhone can simply load an app, and find it? So you hide an air tag on your bike, so you can find it if it gets stolen, thief scans your bike with his phone, finds your ai tag, and removes it, then rides away on your bike. You're spending money for no protection. Apple should be sued for this.
You convinced me to finally do this to 2 of my tags. The 2 I got on my cats can stay for legit stalking. But my escooter & brand new esk8board can do without a beeping.
Your cats stalk you?
@@HelloDappall cats are stalkers
Hahaha! I know what you mean Caprica! We have one on our dog so we can keep track of her as well!
@@charliescene42069 Accurate.
Remember that airtags will also make a sound if disconnected from their owner's iphone for a few days and then moved. That may make your cats very uncomfortable, I know the sound made my dog uncomfortable, so I went ahead and removed the speaker on its airtag.
This is why I use BOTH an Apple AirTag and Samsung SmartTag on some things. I hide them in different places, and if a thief is notified and finds one, they will think they "found it" and they will probably quit looking and not find the other.
That is a great idea!! but won't the other one ping him after he finds the first.
@@brentgreenberg5414 Nope. Not unless he's carrying both an iPhone and a Samsung Android phone.
I am about to buy a samsung tag and I wonder, can the samsung tag potentially alert thiefs like the apple tag?
@@fofopads4450 Not to my knowledge, but there's no guarantee that Samsung wouldn't add that later.
Thank you
You don't have to destroy the airtag. Just pack the airtag in a latex glove and tape it several times with some acoustic foam. Noone will hear it I promise. I tried I cannot hear a damn thing.
Thanks so much for this video! I feel better knowing that a thief won’t easily be able to find the AirTag now that I have removed the speaker. BTW, I broke all three tabs prying it open and I didn’t need to glue it back together. It locked back in place just fine. 😊
We have them in all our travel bags, cars, trailers etc. It is anoying when the wife takes my car or uses my bag for a vaction or the kids take school trip etc. Apple needs a family plan for the air tags too.
Keep a cheap iPhone constantly plugged in (se or 8s or higher) in your car that stop the anti stalker feature from activating (I use samsung so when I forgot to replug the iPhone back in it sets off my Samsung phone that my own tags are following me)
I the uk we have a 3uk sim that gives you 150mb every month for free
How easy it has become for someone who knows someone's an android user, can stalk that person at all times without worrying they would ever get notified about it.
Nice 4 minute video.
welcome, you actually nailed the way stalkers and thiefs actually use the airtags, if he cant find it, you wont find it either when a bad actor is following you specially when they are trying to get your car and its attached to the chassis somewhere...
But you'll at least know it's there👍 In the theft scenario, hopefully the thief can't find it and ditches your bag/item because they now know they're being tracked
i was literally just trying to figure this out last week. i have an airtag attached to my bike incase someone steals it. The airtag is well hidden but then when the bike is moved it makes the chiming noise defeating the purpose of hiding the airtag and also alerting the potential thief that there is an airtag on my bike. I posted to reddit asking if there was a way to disable the chime sound and everyone said no, apple put the chime sound on it so people will know if someone slipped it into their bag or something to track them. As you said Apple's main purpose of the airtag is to track an item you've lost it is not intended to be a tracking device for stolen objects. I am going to be doing this little hack immediately to the airtag on my bike.
Mmm not really defeating the purpose. Most junkie thieving dogs panic if they hear a sound. Consider it an alarm
I have an airtag hidden in my truck and sometimes it chimes, for no apparent reason, as I get in the truck giving away the approximate location and I would imagine also using some of the energy in the battery. I will be doing this mod as soon as I get back home.
@@wayneberry3453 Thieving junkies know every trick in the book . Whatever you think you know they know much more , trust me . But hey maybe the person who steals your stuff is like new the game or something , you never know . =P
@@SabbaticusRex bahahahaha yeh. Junkies are usually reeeeeally smart. Lets just start leaving things unlocked and just hand it to them. 🤷♂️. My stuff doesnt get stolen. Guess i know more than your "genius" junkies bahahaaha
@@SabbaticusRex wait. I am in australia. Theyre pretty fricken dumb haha
Things that never happened: Print guy suggesting to go for lower quality shirts to bring costs down - Lying to seem like a swell guy only to earn more money, such a good human
Hahahaa! I mean, it did happen soooo🤷♂️
When apple notifies you that you are being tracked by one of their devices it should have a popup to give you the option for getting directions to or to call the nearest police station. If you get to the police station and the tracker is still with you then you can start to more safely search your vehicle
While youve got the Tag apart - any way to hook it up to an alternative power source? Maybe hardwire it into the cars electrical somewhere so you dont have to worry about the battery running out of juice or whatever
They need to have a way to set up a enterprise or family account. That would help secure an inventory of valuables be a team. As you probably know, this is done by companies already when they send laptops and tablets to employees, plus other stuff.
iOS 17 lets you share AirTag locations
Thanks for another great video! I'm wondering if the "tag vault", is capable of being sound proof for the air tag? If so, then a person wouldn't have to worry about possibly damaging the air tag when attempting to remove the speaker. Just a thought.
Unfortunately Apple designed that chime with such a high pitched tone that you can hear it through the TagVault and even buried at the bottom of a bag
Airtag update. Link down below.
👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇👇
czcams.com/video/Kst5w5BO_h4/video.html
@@DavidManningvlogThat's a FEATURE not a bug. You're COMPLETELY missing the point of these things.
@@zachansen8293he never said it was a bug lol
I really need this function, but I broke the Airtag.
Thanks anyway for sharing.
Good to know this as I’ve just installed them on my rental bikes and car.for now I’ll only look after midnight until I do this trick.
You could sew the airtag between 2 pieces of fabric to make it built into your bag or even in a car seat than it will be unfindable when paired with the silenced airtag
Every time I wear my OG “Be a Good Human” t-shirt, I get so many compliments!!!
So rad Cliff! We just went to Disneyland and I had one of the new shirts on and got lots of comments! Solid message to spread around👍
my gf too, but she is a 38D
Law enforcement will do absolutely nothing to help you if you call saying there's an air tag following you.
100% Correct
Or if you know where your stolen item is. They don't give a shit. Theft is almost legal in lots of places. You need to hire some people to get it back for you. Like a off duty cop. Fn sad man
Apple really caved for 1 stalking incident. Ruined the half the reason for getting an AirTag.
Saying we shouldn’t sell AirTags because someone might get stalked is like saying we shouldn’t sell knives because someone might get stabbed.
Xacto and rasor blades are not spudgers and using them to pry makes the safety glasses really important.
Correct!
***FOR EVERYONE CONCERNED ABOUT STALKING, AirTags are actually terrible for stalking people. You have to register an AirTag to your Apple ID to activate it, then Apple alerts the person if one is following them. The authorities can then find the AirTag and the person associated with the Apple ID. Terrible for stalking, but great if stalkers do use them because they'll easily be caught. But for the 99.99% of other users out there with good intentions, this makes AirTags a whole lot better👍
what if i want to stalk a stalker?
You forgot to adress what to do once you’ve found the location of the theif. The police won’t have the time and resources to help you, so it’s either up to you to go confront someone or do nothing.
If people start confronting criminals because of this mod, eventually someone is going to get killed. So maybe not such a ”good human” thing to do after all when you consider the real world consequences :/ :(
Yeah. And there's Android users who wont even get the notification.
@@aonshark2517 😂
@@beaconofwierd1883 These were never intended to be an anti-theft device, that's just a side effect of their functionality. And no the police probably don't care about your stolen camera bag, but your car, yes they will help if you can say "hey I can see where it's located" But if you are on vacation and something is stolen from your room and you can see that it's in another room or in some employee area or an employees home then the hotel may assist. It's only $29, I'm sure whatever you had for lunch today costs more.
Thank you for the video! Great tip! I use tiles as well to track my car as a backup. Tiles do not send a beep so you don't have to do this but Tiles do not have as many users as AirTags do so there is that.
I never watched your channel but I actually stopped because of your shirt. Really people the shirt says it all. Great vid and I ordered a shirt!
Thank you for this lesson!! I had thought about getting a few airtags for things like my cat if he got out o r lost, my suv, (Hey, free LoJack!), my luggage when I travel etc..but I never thought that the crook would be alerted to it and then hear it! I could easily sew it into a suitcase and with the sound speaker removed keep it hidden somehat well!! Thank you !!
This cap is so stealth that you can put in the wheels of your bag. Such an amazing thing
As per the sales pitch for your "BE A GOOD HUMAN" shirts at the intro here while talking about the beneficial, as well as malicious, uses of Apple's Air Tags and their ability to track objects as well as people, you mentioned that they would be good "stocking stuffers" this Christmas season.
Or did you mean stalking stuffers?
Don't remove the speaker, just put tape over/around it so that it doesn't make a connection or it stops vibrating (no vibrations > no sound)
Maybe a bit of hot glue, so you can remove it in one pull?
@@Shadow__133 it will still need to fit within the coil, so it depends.
Well it’s pretty useful to remove the speaker but on another iPhone or apple device you can just select that AirTag that has been placed on an object and select the option of stop tracking and that’s it, just disarm the airtag from another device, I say this from experience that happened to my sister on a eurotrip.
You can never disable an airtag wirelessly, the most you can do is remove it from your account and only the owner can do that.
Fantastic Video David. I was looking for a way to keep track of my Legacy 3.6R in the event that it is stolen. Subaru has the ability to track for me, but at a cost of $149 per year. This helped so much. You are indeed a good human brother. I will be purchasing one of your awesome shirts as well. Keep the GOOD ENERGY flowing. Cheers! -Eddie D., Chicago, Illinois
Thank you.
I'm sure somebody has already mentioned this, but it wouldn't it be nice of Apple to make it an option to turn the speaker off on your AirTags?
And why?
@@ducockk If you want to turn the speaker off.
The app should pop up the question “are you a stalker?”
No, since that's a safety feature for other people.
Apple making something better easily hahaha good luck
The secret to fool the thief would be to plant two airtags in the bag, one with sound (planted in a more obvious place) and one without (hidden in the lining or somewhere more obscure). When they were alerted that there was an air tag they would find the more obvious one with sound and then assume that they had found the one. Should the alert keep going off from the other one they would probably assume that it was from the first one (the one with sound) since they are in the same area.
I wonder if they receive 2 distinct notifications about an AirTag following them, or if the notification says there’s 2 AirTags following them..?
I used two AirTags when I was flying with my golf clubs. One in an obvious place and the other much more hidden. I had never heard about taking the speaker out before. That is a great idea to have one with sound and one silent. As long as it doesn’t specifically alert the thief that there’s two AirTags following them.
@@Husker_ probably would alert on the second one too
Too bad criminals are using these to track a person's car or a person. Just stick the airtag on a car or drop it in someone's pocket or purse, then follow them home... So terrible.
This video tutorial was SUCH a joy to watch! very entertaining and informative not boring at all.. Way to go
They should add the stole item mode where you can't track the item anymore (thus preventing stalking) while it doesn't inform its existence amymore to the people around it. Instead it sends the report to officers.
The perfect way to SWAT people.
yes cuz i 100% want to have devices autosend police reports. Terrible idea,
@@rohansampat1995 sounds like a great idea to me. I would love to have the police go find my stolen stuff. I have an air tag on my $8,000 bike, camera equipment bag with $10,000 in equipment and my laptop bag. Have no reason to hide these from the police. But I don't they'd be willing to go on that goose chase.
Bahahaha AAAAAAAAHAHAHAHA yeh. By the time the report is adhered to, the item is in the hockshop, bought 10 times... and 30 years have gone by. Im friends with a few police officers and i bag the absolute sh@$ out of them for things like this lol
@@Nickporter17 yep. Wouldnt matter the value of the item(s) haha. Bigger fish to fry and all that stuff
Coolest hiding place I’ve seen is a camera body cap that had something like that vault built into it. Even if someone just grabs the camera out of a case, the air tag goes with it.
Which camera was it?
@@Nickporter17 Several third party manufacturers - KUVRD CosmoCap and Nine Volt AirCap for instance.
@@zooloo73 ah I get it. Super cool!
That’s awesome. Very clever.
if you leave the coil in there, if the airtag was touching a magnet or anything magnetic, it would still beep but will only be heard in a completely quiet room.
For making sure your luggage is following you on a trip you're taking, they are great!!!
I think this is the absolute best use case for AirTags!
Props on being able to make a 11 minute long video on how to open 3 tabs
An*
@@wayneberry3453 Ann Uumellmahaye?
@@zarmindrow5831 only speak english
@@wayneberry3453 czcams.com/video/YT0CScFzp1o/video.html
This is awesome. The next time I replace the batteries in all my vehicles and bags, I’ll have to remove the speakers. Those cases are also pretty cool. I feel like the stalker update only harms law abiding citizens. There’s probably 10,000 thefts to every stalker.
Stalker update ?
7:00 all good but the thief still gets the notification
This could have been a 30 second video!
This seems like a good idea! But this doesn't completely solve the problem of a thieve disabling it. Because precision finding will still screw you over even without the speaker inside.
Truth
Well good news, the prompt for seeing if an AirTag is tracking you doesn't allow precision finding, so the thief won't be able to find it still. The problem, however, is if a stalker stumbles on this video and utilizes this hack to find where people live. If people can't find it, it'll be too late when they do.
@@LVessell Not tying to argue, but on Apple’s website it specifically says this:
“We’re also investigating a series of updates that we plan to introduce later this year, including:
Precision Finding: This capability allows recipients of an unwanted tracking alert to locate an unknown AirTag with precision. iPhone 11, iPhone 12, and iPhone 13 users will be able to use Precision Finding to see the distance and direction to an unknown AirTag when it is in range.” So much for just disabling the speaker.
@@shawndavismedia I was just thinking this. If Apple is set on not allowing the AirTags to stealthily track anyone there’s no way in hell ppl will beat Apple with a lil DIY. I could also see them straight up disabling AirTags that have been tampered with or are ”functioning incorrectly” in the future.
Precision finding is only enabled for the registered owner of that tag.
Good thing Apple made it so now you can also use the ultra wide band chip to track the AirTag down to the inch without needing to use the sound.
I have that same case , The pressure it applies to the soft side is great enough to disable the speaker. Give it a try.
30 seconds of information packed into a fancy 10 minute video.
AirTags were never intended to be anti-theft devices. They are only intended to help in finding misplaced items.
Aaaand hammers were never intended to hit anything other than nails. Phones were never intended to do anything other than making calls.
No shit. Hence this trick
@@hn2405 yeah because that would've saved him from having to read your dimwitted comments
who cares?
Every air tag thread I come across there is always some joker reminding the entire internet that apple "never intend airtags to be anti theft devices" yessssss... WE KNOW. You are not teaching anyone anything with your words.
AirTag came to the rescue last week when my Kindergartener mistakenly got on the bus when no one was able to be home. Fortunately, I was alerted that her backpack was on the move and was able to meet the bus at the intermediate school and tell the principal at that school she was there.
Just bought an old car. I am trying to see where and how to put one of these things in there
First time seeing anything about airtags I just bought 5 , this was awesome. Cool sweater btw im gonna buy one.
Thanks for mentioning that Airtag was designed for things such as finding lost items. Somehow, people came to believe it was created to find stolen items. It wasn't!! If you have something that was stolen, and you were able to use an Airtag, Tile, or Samsung Smart Tag to find it, great, but that's not what they were originally designed for.
The problem with that use case is that if something is large enough that I can store an Airtag inside of them, they're large enough to not get lost.
Why would anyone lose something? Oh Apple customers.
Yeah.. why would anyone else want to take another person’s bike, or bags? Makes no sense. 🤔
@@dannyo1471 Exactly! I've got one in each of my PWCs and my motorcycle. Sub $30 device and no subscription. I have never lost either of those before.
@@anlumo1 I wouldn’t say so exactly. AirTags are small enough to fit into a bag of practically any size from a book bag, a camera bag to one of those tiny coin type bags. A busy/side tracked person or more commonly children can put the bag down get roped into other adventures before realizing they left it behind. A person can then track the AirTag instead of trying to remember every location they been that it where it might be.
Would note as one of those things where it’s easy to look at and think you couldn’t possibly lose track of something until the day comes where you do and wish you had a way to recover it easier.
I’ve seen so many videos on this 6-12 months ago. Basically this exact video. You basically redid a bunch of other peoples content so you really didn’t scour the depths of Reddit, you simply just watched someone else’s and did it yourself, that’s how you knew where “exactly” the tabs were.
Well Alek, you were way ahead of me then!
There was a person that could breathe before you, please stop breathing 🎉
Reminds me of buying old PCs. Before turning on, open case and yank speaker.
The good ole days!
Great selling for Android. TY... Seriously though great information thanks. Was curious about Air Tags and what the big thing is about them. Being Android user it is always good to checkup on what others are using these days. Great video. Super organized work space love it.
Owner of the airtag should have the option to mute the sound and enable the sound once you are in very close proximity of your airtag and you are in a safe environment. Otherwise wait for the police once you know the approximate location of you lost item. Apple airtag as most comments say, will not thwart stalkers since both the stalker and stalkee will be notified of the airtags and provided both parties are using iPhones or using a tracking device.
That's what I would do if I were a stalker.
Nope.
keep in mind the airtags give the location of the nearest device that detects them, not the actual location of the airtag. So in common use, its where you iphone with bluetooth is, but the airtag could be anywhere in range, but showing your iphone gps location. If you put it into missing mode, then the location of the gps of the iphone that detects it, which gives you a good idea, just not exact location. I think as an anti theft device in a car it would work as it would be detected where the car was taken to ... and only starts alerting about 24 hours later, which you could be able to location it before then. And not all thefts would have iphones.
Thanks for explaining the vital details to me, other comments have only given somewhat vague details, - 'I thought that there was more to the story' than others had told, glad you took the trouble to write.
Those who know how electricity works know that removing the speaker will cause high resistance on the circuit when there's nowhere for the power to go when it wants to beep. This is turn will dramatically reduce the lifespan of the airtag.
There is a much easier way involving attacking the 2 wires through your battery. I bought these after my neighbor got his truck stolen. If the carjacker gets notified and can beep it kind of defeats the purpose. Still gets notified potentially but is much harder to find.
If only they could allow family sharing for my child… peace of mind 🙏🏼