Privacy respecting alternative to airtags
I lost a bunch of keys today. It sucks and it's gonna cost me a lot of money to replace the locks. I want to to add an airtag-like device to my key ring in the future. However I don't know of any device that works in a similar fashion, either through bluetooth or GPS, that works with Graphene and doesn't require some kind of privacy invading online subscription.
Do you have any advice on privacy respecting alternatives to airtags?
StrawberryPigtails
in reply to ISOmorph • • •comrade_twisty
in reply to StrawberryPigtails • • •rnercle
in reply to comrade_twisty • • •50€ for cat version with 5 day battery time + a monthly fee
no way!
vinniep
in reply to comrade_twisty • • •artyom
in reply to ISOmorph • • •Unfortunately having a private option is completely antithetical to the way these things function.
Your only other option is traditional trackers with GPS/modem and a cell plan.
Kowowow
in reply to ISOmorph • • •Lyra_Lycan
in reply to ISOmorph • • •solrize
in reply to Lyra_Lycan • • •Sticker tag sounds like NFC. Certainly a bluetooth tag is possible too. Thing is, Bluetooth range is a few dozen meters tops. Airtag works by turning the entire Iphone population into a giant surveillance network, so if any iphone anywhere detects your airtag, it informs the Apple mothership, which in turn reports to you where your airtag was just seen.
Only comparable long distance approach I can think of without that is a cellular tracker. Those exist (search: cellular gps pet tracker) but it's a much bigger box with a subscription plan of its own. Someone else mentioned meshtastic so maybe that's an alternative in some places, or a LoRA tag instead of a bluetooth tag.
HiddenLayer555
in reply to Lyra_Lycan • • •Sounds kind of like UHF RFID, which are common in places like warehouses and can be done at a distance, but even higher frequency?
I imagine range was a huge issue. Unless you have an extremely powerful bluetooth tranceiver and a very high gain antenna (i.e. not a phone, a professional radio system), the inverse square law will mean you won't have enough energy to activate the electronics in the tag after a fairly short distance. Would probably work for finding something in your house though.
doodoo_wizard
in reply to ISOmorph • • •I’ve answered this question for someone else in the context of tracking luggage. Your use case is also one that the branded apple airtags are best at.
If you want a big headache project that doesn’t work then try anything but airtags.
Theres an android find my app and you can run it in a container in graphene.
If you want a quick, simple, functional solution to your problem then bite the bullet and use airtags.
You, uh, also maybe shouldn’t be asking for “privacy respecting” electronic tracking devices. The application is fundamentally not private and cannot respect privacy by design.
Brkdncr
in reply to ISOmorph • • •Seeed meshtastic tracker card. The general purpose version uses more battery than I’d like but you can get one that only does tracking or turn off most of features to get more than a few days of life.
It only works if you have some other meshtastic nodes around, but it doesn’t need to be a lot and it’s getting to be more popular.
ISOmorph
in reply to Brkdncr • • •Lyra_Lycan
in reply to ISOmorph • • •Search less. Smile more. - Chipolo
ChipoloGaumBeist
in reply to ISOmorph • • •A few answers say "they aren't private by design," but don't really go into the "why." There's the obvious "it's an electronic tracking device, duh" reason, but there's also a more nuanced reason:
Airtags are able to be picked up almost anywhere because they connect to the nearest bluetooth-enabled Apple device, and then send location info across the internet to you. Without this functionality (the ability of any and every Apple device to locate it), they wouldn't have any way to send their location back to the owner.
Your best "privacy respecting" alternatives are something that uses meshtastic (and hoping there's enough repeaters near you), something that uses cellular data and GPS (which is about as privacy-respecting as Airtags are), or just a key finder/beeper (which only works within a small radius)
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ISOmorph
in reply to GaumBeist • • •