NEW YORK - In response to growing concerns about how stalkers, thieves, abusive partners, and other dangerous people have been using Apple AirTags — coin-sized tracking devices — to target victims, a privacy group is calling on the tech giant to permanently pull the gadgets from store shelves.
The group Surveillance Technology Oversight Project, or STOP, said Apple claims it promises to protect people's privacy yet "profits from surveillance.""When survivors and advocates warned Apple that AirTags were dangerous, the company refused to listen.
They claimed that their technical fixes would prevent abuse," STOP Executive Director Albert Fox Cahn said in a statement. "Today, we see that they’re wrong and that AirTags are being abused in exactly the way we feared." Apple AirTag devices are meant to help Apple iPhone or iPad users locate personal items.
Apple AirTags can be attached to keys, purses, backpacks, and even pets so that the user can track them down. The devices use Bluetooth technology.But since Apple AirTags came to market in April 2021, numerous reports have surfaced of people using the eerily precise devices for nefarious reasons, such as secretly keeping tabs on potential crime victims.Sports Illustrated Swimsuit model Brooks Nader said that a stranger planted an Apple AirTag in her coat while she was at a New York City bar on Jan.