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I live in Seattle and have had my car broken into three times. Each time, they steal my iPhone's USB cable. I wonder, could they add cellular connectivity to th
by aabajian 5y ago
I live in Seattle and have had my car broken into three times. Each time, they steal my iPhone's USB cable. I wonder, could they add cellular connectivity to this cable and use it as a GPS locator?
- lucideer 5y agoNot sure about GPS but it includes remote access via WiFi, and some of the cables on offer quote "Long Range WiFi (2 KM+)"
- Y_Y 5y agoWhy can't all my devices have 2km WiFi‽
- VenTatsu 5y agoThe cables have 2km WiFi with a directional antenna (presumably on the other end), you could probably get similar range out of most of your devices if your bases station had a directional antenna, but that eliminates much of the value for many WiFi applications.
- megous 5y agoBecause you'd share bandwidth with 100k other people in a city. You'd be glad for the days of dialup.
- cbg0 5y agoAre they really breaking into your car just to steal your USB cable or is there other stuff you leave in plain sight?
- shepherdjerred 5y agoLightning cables are expensive, and Apple is definitely encouraging car theft by not including them in the box anymore. edit: this was a joke and it got appropriately downvoted. I regret nothing.
- deelowe 5y agoA cable that costs $20 - $30 retail NEW doesn't seem worth risking jail time over.
- jtbayly 5y agoIt's like soap, which is much cheaper. Both are easily sold.
- chooseaname 5y agoYou may be underestimating how significant $20-$30 is to some people. Edit: wording.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- deelowe 5y agoAre you suggesting a stolen cable brings the same sort of premium as a new one from Apple? Regardless, I'm not suggesting this at all. My point is that there are likely ways to get something worth so little without risking significant jail time.
- progman32 5y agoPeople break into cars to steal pocket change in the cup holder, so a $5 cable isn't outside the realm of what a thief would grab. Especially if they're already in the car.
- fragmede 5y agoI'm in San Francisco, so not Seattle, but cars get broken into for the sport of it by this point. A friend's had her window broken and used, gross dog leashes and an old Nokia charger stolen. The lost hours of work to replace the window was the real cost to her dog walking business.
- Karrot_Kream 5y agoJust park with your windows open if there's nothing they can really take. Repairing the window isn't with the cost or the time.
- kevinmgranger 5y agoThat might help in San Francisco, but in Seattle, that's lost hours dealing with a soaked interior.
- Karrot_Kream 5y agoYeah this isn't for rainy or dusty environments for sure.
- ddalex 5y agoIt may be getting soaked in SF too, but with different kind of fluids
- rOOb85 5y agoThanks for the f-shack - Dirty Mike & The Boys
- 1-6 5y agoProblem in San Francisco is, you'll get people sleeping in your car if you do that.
- dugmartin 5y agoDepending on the height of your windows I would think sleeping would be the best thing other people could do to your car.
- SavantIdiot 5y agoMy car was broken into 3pm in the afternooon in Austin last summer. Nothing visible. They emptied the console and glovebox. They stole: * cheap sunglasses * tire pressure gauge * box of bandaids * my car's USER MANUAL, ffs * charging cable They left: * small envelope with $80 cash tucked under the removable console coin holder. * all the coins. So very confused.
- exikyut 5y agoArmchair theory: taking the stereotypical idea of "squirrel on crack" both seriously and literally, maybe people on drugs become like bowerbirds with very, very broken interestingness ranking. All the stuff you mentioned was immediately visible (so no complex problem solving to find it) and would probably look "definitely probably valuable" to a hyped up 5 year old. Aaaaand thennnn whoever did the stealing probably just sold it all to someone else in _exactly the same condition_ (high on whatever) who also considered it valuable enough to make a fair trade to swap it all for $amount of $thing. I'm not sure what the balance is, but it's part-hilarious and part-sad that, if this theory is correct, there's an utterly illogical commodity market being sustained by tweaked-out squirrels with half the attention span of a goldfish, leaves people scratching their heads in its wake, and is so confusingly successful people just don't park in certain places.
- payme 5y ago>https://www.ebay.com/itm/223990414124 https://www.ebay.com/itm/223990414124 From lrvick's comment.
- voiper1 5y agoSounds like now you should be worried if they "leave" your iPhone USB cable, they might have switched it with one that hacks you.
- PeterisP 5y agoDo you mean something like this - https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005001759023561.html https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005001759023561.html ? You'd just have to look for a version with the proper connector that you need, that particular example is microUSB but there are similar cables for iPhone.
- baybal2 5y agoI think you need to consider an armoured Mercedes