The Next Web:
San Francisco Police Department has released footage of two recent Apple store robberies in the Bay Area, which took place on November 25 and November 29 (respectively) in the vicinity of Chestnut Street in San Francisco.
The first video captures three perpetrators daringly walk in, grab whatever they can and swiftly storm out – and all of that in the window of less than 15 seconds. Similarly, the second clip catches four men perform the same maneuver with almost identical pace.
In both cases, startled staff and customers merely watch the criminals make off with a bunch of gadgets in their hands.
It’d be interesting to know what Apple is doing about this problem, if anything. Does this fall into the category of nuisance, a small enough loss that Apple writes down the loss and moves on? Is there a stealth effort, after the fact, that tracks down the thieves via a Find My iPhone type mechanism?
Since this ultimately signals demand, MSFT might be claiming similar store break-ins shortly.
Apple recently removed the tethers on many devices at the stores, so clearly there is some strategy on their part to mitigate this risk.
The newly un-tethered phones cease to function once they’re out of range of the store’s wifi. Sort of an advanced Activation Lock. Some details here: https://www.cnet.com/news/apple-unveils-redesigned-london-store/