A Southern California woman fed up with her packages getting stolen out of her post office box sent an Apple AirTag to the address and cleverly tracked down the suspected thief, police said.

The woman had had several items stolen from her mailbox at the Los Alamos Post Office already when she thought of the idea, the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Office said Tuesday. Apple’s $29 AirTags have become popular items since their 2021 release, helping users keep tabs on the location of anything from their lost keys to wallets and luggage.

On Monday morning, sheriff’s deputies were called to the post office where the woman told officials her mail had been stolen again — including the package with the AirTag.

  • Hegar@fedia.io
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    3 months ago

    A friend of mine had his phone snatched on the bus, so he had me call his phone and pretend to be the phone company, telling the thief that he’d won a new phone and I just needed his address.

    The police were very happy that we’d done their job for them, and they got his phone back.

    • khannie@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      LOOOL. Something similarly stupid happened to a friend of mine. His phone got stolen in a nightclub but it was a rather unusual phone. He saw it for sale a few days later on our equivalent of craigslist and offered to buy it. Thing is the guy was a professional fighter and he turned up with a good friend who was a bouncer and also fought out of the same club.

      Anyway…The person selling it was the bouncer from the club it had been stolen from. Someone would go around robbing phones from the club then sell them to the bouncer at a hefty discount and he would then sell them on. He apologised profusely and tried to explain his way out of it yada yada.

      Friend got his phone back anyway.