I don’t see this as the smartphone manufacturers problem. They make a device that thieves want to steal — how can they combat that? Is Nike going to make their shoes explode if stolen?
NY Attorney General asks Apple, others what they are doing about smartphone thefts
Having just lost two iPads and a MacBook to theft, Apple will mark the serial numbers as stolen and if the products are registered again they are flagged. Other than that, I’m not sure what the AG thinks any company should do. What’s Samsung doing?
Maybe the Attorney General should increase the penalty for these thefts. Apple has nothing to do with it.
Apple should really do more here. Not because some fancy lawyer is telling them to but because they want to make their customers happy.
I don’t want the government dictating what backdoors should exist on my cell phone. But I would like to feel safe knowing that my phone is not an attractive target to thieves.
Are they also asking GM and Ford what they’re doing about car thefts?
Samsung is ensuring the continued satisfaction of it’s customers by making cheap plastic Apple product knockoffs that can be easily replaced if stolen.
/Obligatory
Problem is that criminals
can turn of the phone
can change the IMEI.
can sell it overseas.
iphone gets full price even if it is used.
If fingerprint is introduced then they
will hijack you to unlock the phone.
if iwatch is introduced to unlock then they will steal
the iwatch along with iphone.
There is no kill switch that could be devised
that can’t be undone whether software or hardware.
Real issue is the cost of iphone is high because of all the royalties, taxes, and patents. even then they will be
stolen in order to facilitate crime.
Apple already has a remote lock, track, and wipe feature. How many more back doors do you need?
How about enforcing the law? Is that something you feel comfortable having government do?
And what are your suggestions to Apple on how to “do more”?
What an opportunist, noodle-headed thing for a public official to say.
FWIW, Nike, GM, Ford, etc. have all been asked by law enforcement, and by the public, what they can due to curb theft of their products. Nike especially has been taken to task over the theft of their shoes in the inner city. Apple is not being singled out for speical treatment in this case.
And what about jewelry makers? Should they put in anti-theft chips in everything?
How about trying to solve the big picture problem behind why people steal. Cure the disease, not just treat the symptoms.
And that’s surprising how? 🙂
Yeah. I’m just old enough to remember one or two NY attorneys general who actually did their jobs well before they began looking for bigger spotlights.
Of all the products that are stolen most often, high-tech devices like smartphones would be the easiest to build anti-theft features into.
I left my iPad in a shopping cart and someone took it. I used the Find My Phone app to watch it go down the road and disappear when the person realized I was tracking them from the lost mode message that is displayed. This is too easy to circumvent.
Luckily, due to a police department that actually cared, they were able to retrieve it after matching a purchase made at the store to video tape of the suspect.
But I understand that my experience is atypical. Especially in larger cities where the police have bigger concerns.
It would seem fairly easy to conceive of a way to use an embedded identifier that is broadcast on any network that a lost or stolen device is connected to that can survive a reset or removal of a SIM (such as a device’s IMEI). The carriers should all have a process that checks a phone’s ID against a central list of lost or stolen devices before it can be activated. I think that the lure of stealing or misappropriating a lost device is reduced if it’s well known that someone can’t activate the device.