6 ms·

The problem I see with this is that your phone always has to be broadcasting the BLE beacon, regardless of if it is lost or not. Otherwise it could randomly end

The problem I see with this is that your phone always has to be broadcasting the BLE beacon, regardless of if it is lost or not. Otherwise it could randomly end up lost in a place with poor/no service... and would never be found For phones, how often is this really an issue? Sure, this is useful for the Tile type "dumb" devices... but if my phone has no cell or data service... it's probably because the battery is dead.

president 7y ago
Also, couldn't the BLE beacon be used by "smash and grab" thieves to find devices in your car?
- m-app 7y ago
  Yes, and this is already happening due to the feature that Macbooks have to connect to eg. BL keyboards and mouses. Perhaps also the "Smart Sleep" function (not sure what it's called exactly) that periodically connects to Wifi to fetch emails so they're there when you open your Mac again. This has happened to me and other folks here in NL, by the way.
Uehreka 7y ago
Some people have hypothesized that this isn't necessarily for finding phones. This might be about using phones (and iPads, Apple Watches, MacBooks, etc.) to create a network like the one used by the Tile product for finding wallets, keys, etc. This could be a product Apple unveils in September.
- m0dest 7y ago
  This is for tracking lost MacBooks. Apple said this at the keynote. They may expand it beyond laptops, but that's the initial scenario. (It's a great one.)
Slippery_John 7y ago
I can think of several scenarios: * I lost the phone hiking somewhere with no signal * I lost the phone / it was stolen while in airplane mode * I lost the phone while traveling abroad without any local service This finding service will work for wifi-only ipads, wifi-only apple watches, and macbooks in addition to the likely tracking tokens.
- Fnoord 7y ago
  Stolen while in airplane mode, and you're going to rely on BLE? A "good" thief would learn that he'd need to carry around a Faraday cage (read: some tinfoil) to block the signals. The only disadvantage is that the act of putting tinfoil around an iPhone then becomes suspicious.
  - marcinzm 7y ago
    They'd just have a tinfoil lined bag. No suspicion. I bet you can buy one one Amazon for next to nothing as it is.
  - alexkavon 7y ago
    Someone could wrap a phone in tinfoil pretty quickly or have one ready-made in the shape of a pouch. Or start carrying a special pouch that stops signals.[0] Either way once you remove the phone from sight, the suspicion is probably over. The only next step is to kill the signal. [0] https://www.overyondr.com/howitworks https://www.overyondr.com/howitworks
    - V99 7y ago
      Yondr pouches don't actually block RF, they just physically prevent you from using the phone because it's in a sack held closed with a magnetic lock.
      - alexkavon 7y ago
        Ah good to know. I assumed they were lined with lead and/or tinfoil
rootusrootus 7y ago
Given how little power it takes to operate something like a Tile, maybe the beacon will continue operating for quite a while after the battery is too low to operate the whole phone.
ladberg 7y ago
Complete speculation here, but I wouldn't be surprised if devices could keep broadcasting the ping after they're "dead". Tiles last for years without charging, so I bet if Apple can leave on only the bluetooth beacon after the battery drains past where it can power the rest of the phone then this would be doable. Again complete speculation, I have zero clue if the current hardware is even capable of doing this.
- snazz 7y ago
  The current hardware might not be, but you could run this on a secondary chip similar in specs to the T2 or Secure Enclave. You could theoretically even have a second battery specifically for this purpose, but that would likely be cost-prohibitive.
  - etaoins 7y ago
    The T2 chip is a derivative of the A10. It has similar power requirements to the SOC in modern iPhones. They could probably use a cut down derivative of the W2 chip used in AirPods with the audio codec etc. removed. I’m guessing phone batteries reach a point where they’re still storing energy but can’t provide enough current to safely boot the whole phone. The BLE chip could sip on the remainder of the battery for a long time.
    - snazz 7y ago
      That sounds reasonable. I had no idea the T2 was that powerful.
      - Phlarp 7y ago
        It's also the SSD controller, and quite impressive in that regard.
        photojosh 7y ago
        I bet the T3, whenever that arrives, will be a derivative of the A12 or A13, and provide the neural network accelerator to MacOS and CoreML.
MBCook 7y ago
Don’t think phone. In the keynote I think they showed it with a Mac, which isn’t available with cell service. Or as someone else mentioned maybe you have an iPad without cellular. It would be useful for those.
- ShakataGaNai 7y ago
  Fair point. For wifi only devices, I could see it having some use.
xt00 7y ago
Apple is highly averse to having your phone send out any BLE beacon all the time. Likely what they will do is the following: 1) The iPhone will be considered the "master" (aka BLE Central device) 2) All of your devices that you enroll in your "find my" service will be required to sending out a periodic BLE beacon or a similar bluetooth packet (BLE peripheral device) 3) The iPhone will periodically listen for BLE beacons and upon receiving that beacon it has 3 options: ->option 1, save the time/location when it saw that beacon ->option 2, scan the device with a BLE "scan request" operation which asks the device to provide more information -- it provides the "scan response" packet which can and often is different from the main advertisement packet ->option 3, connect to the device and query further information like your macbook battery level and maybe other info For option 1, the iPhone never needs to send a packet ever and will simply have its BLE RX radio stage on listening for advertisement packets -- which are sent in clear text for anybody to listen to. The RX stage is listening periodically and works on a statistical basis where if the beacon side is transmitting very rarely then you can easily miss the beacon. So.. what you should take away from this is that highly likely Apple will only allow the iPhone to be the master and all of your other devices will be periodically sending out beacons. So if you have this enabled and you walk around with your iPad Pro and your iPhone together and people sniff bluetooth packets, they can track when you walk down the sidewalk past you every day. For example if you live near a busy street in New York or something, start sniffing for bluetooth packets and you'll find tons of stuff. Tons.. most of it is random bluetooth headphones, but pretty soon it will be iPad Pro's.
taneq 7y ago
> your phone always has to be broadcasting the BLE beacon, regardless of if it is lost or not It could have an X-hour "deadman timer" after which if it still hasn't successfully phoned home and been told it's not lost, it starts pinging?

president 7y ago

Also, couldn't the BLE beacon be used by "smash and grab" thieves to find devices in your car?

m-app 7y ago
Yes, and this is already happening due to the feature that Macbooks have to connect to eg. BL keyboards and mouses. Perhaps also the "Smart Sleep" function (not sure what it's called exactly) that periodically connects to Wifi to fetch emails so they're there when you open your Mac again. This has happened to me and other folks here in NL, by the way.

Uehreka 7y ago

Some people have hypothesized that this isn't necessarily for finding phones. This might be about using phones (and iPads, Apple Watches, MacBooks, etc.) to create a network like the one used by the Tile product for finding wallets, keys, etc. This could be a product Apple unveils in September.

m0dest 7y ago
This is for tracking lost MacBooks. Apple said this at the keynote. They may expand it beyond laptops, but that's the initial scenario. (It's a great one.)

Slippery_John 7y ago

I can think of several scenarios: * I lost the phone hiking somewhere with no signal * I lost the phone / it was stolen while in airplane mode * I lost the phone while traveling abroad without any local service This finding service will work for wifi-only ipads, wifi-only apple watches, and macbooks in addition to the likely tracking tokens.

Fnoord 7y ago
Stolen while in airplane mode, and you're going to rely on BLE? A "good" thief would learn that he'd need to carry around a Faraday cage (read: some tinfoil) to block the signals. The only disadvantage is that the act of putting tinfoil around an iPhone then becomes suspicious.
- marcinzm 7y ago
  They'd just have a tinfoil lined bag. No suspicion. I bet you can buy one one Amazon for next to nothing as it is.
- alexkavon 7y ago
  Someone could wrap a phone in tinfoil pretty quickly or have one ready-made in the shape of a pouch. Or start carrying a special pouch that stops signals.[0] Either way once you remove the phone from sight, the suspicion is probably over. The only next step is to kill the signal. [0] https://www.overyondr.com/howitworks https://www.overyondr.com/howitworks
  - V99 7y ago
    Yondr pouches don't actually block RF, they just physically prevent you from using the phone because it's in a sack held closed with a magnetic lock.
    - alexkavon 7y ago
      Ah good to know. I assumed they were lined with lead and/or tinfoil

rootusrootus 7y ago

Given how little power it takes to operate something like a Tile, maybe the beacon will continue operating for quite a while after the battery is too low to operate the whole phone.

ladberg 7y ago

Complete speculation here, but I wouldn't be surprised if devices could keep broadcasting the ping after they're "dead". Tiles last for years without charging, so I bet if Apple can leave on only the bluetooth beacon after the battery drains past where it can power the rest of the phone then this would be doable. Again complete speculation, I have zero clue if the current hardware is even capable of doing this.

snazz 7y ago
The current hardware might not be, but you could run this on a secondary chip similar in specs to the T2 or Secure Enclave. You could theoretically even have a second battery specifically for this purpose, but that would likely be cost-prohibitive.
- etaoins 7y ago
  The T2 chip is a derivative of the A10. It has similar power requirements to the SOC in modern iPhones. They could probably use a cut down derivative of the W2 chip used in AirPods with the audio codec etc. removed. I’m guessing phone batteries reach a point where they’re still storing energy but can’t provide enough current to safely boot the whole phone. The BLE chip could sip on the remainder of the battery for a long time.
  - snazz 7y ago
    That sounds reasonable. I had no idea the T2 was that powerful.
    - Phlarp 7y ago
      It's also the SSD controller, and quite impressive in that regard.
      - photojosh 7y ago
        I bet the T3, whenever that arrives, will be a derivative of the A12 or A13, and provide the neural network accelerator to MacOS and CoreML.

MBCook 7y ago

Don’t think phone. In the keynote I think they showed it with a Mac, which isn’t available with cell service. Or as someone else mentioned maybe you have an iPad without cellular. It would be useful for those.

ShakataGaNai 7y ago
Fair point. For wifi only devices, I could see it having some use.

xt00 7y ago

Apple is highly averse to having your phone send out any BLE beacon all the time. Likely what they will do is the following: 1) The iPhone will be considered the "master" (aka BLE Central device) 2) All of your devices that you enroll in your "find my" service will be required to sending out a periodic BLE beacon or a similar bluetooth packet (BLE peripheral device) 3) The iPhone will periodically listen for BLE beacons and upon receiving that beacon it has 3 options: ->option 1, save the time/location when it saw that beacon ->option 2, scan the device with a BLE "scan request" operation which asks the device to provide more information -- it provides the "scan response" packet which can and often is different from the main advertisement packet ->option 3, connect to the device and query further information like your macbook battery level and maybe other info For option 1, the iPhone never needs to send a packet ever and will simply have its BLE RX radio stage on listening for advertisement packets -- which are sent in clear text for anybody to listen to. The RX stage is listening periodically and works on a statistical basis where if the beacon side is transmitting very rarely then you can easily miss the beacon. So.. what you should take away from this is that highly likely Apple will only allow the iPhone to be the master and all of your other devices will be periodically sending out beacons. So if you have this enabled and you walk around with your iPad Pro and your iPhone together and people sniff bluetooth packets, they can track when you walk down the sidewalk past you every day. For example if you live near a busy street in New York or something, start sniffing for bluetooth packets and you'll find tons of stuff. Tons.. most of it is random bluetooth headphones, but pretty soon it will be iPad Pro's.

taneq 7y ago

> your phone always has to be broadcasting the BLE beacon, regardless of if it is lost or not It could have an X-hour "deadman timer" after which if it still hasn't successfully phoned home and been told it's not lost, it starts pinging?