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That’s not how I understand them to work. When you pair a tag with a device they agree a shared key which is used to create a temporary identifier that changes

That’s not how I understand them to work. When you pair a tag with a device they agree a shared key which is used to create a temporary identifier that changes every couple of hours. The tag broadcasts this identifier every few seconds, and nearby devices who hear it create a location message based on their position and encrypt it using the identifier as a public key, and then send that to Apple. Apple can’t read that message. Only the paired device can recreate the current temporary private key and decode for location data, etc. The paired device knows what the current temporary identifier should be and just asks Apple for any associated messages the Find My network may have received In theory Apple can’t snoop any of this - as long as the shared secret does leave the paired devices. It’s always possible there’s a back-door for targeted unveiling under legal obligation, of-course - but it’s supposed to be private under general use.

bigiain 5y ago
I was responding to the last sentence: "If Apple is using iPhones to pair location and MAC addresses of nearby devices, that is indeed "location being tracked by other people's iPhones"." My AirTags have their "location being tracked by other people's iPhones". Sure - if we believe Apple (and I mostly do here) that their protocol and encryption works the way they describe, and that there's no bugs or back doors - then the only person who get to see my AirTag's location is me. But that still means "And Apple have clearly decided that’s ok" that my AirTags have their "location being tracked by other people's iPhones". They're selling me products on the assumption that your iPhone (and everybody else's, or at least enough other iPhone owners to make it useful) will happily listen out for bluetooth signals from AirTags, power up their GPS to get a current location, encrypt a bunch of data, then use your cellular data plan to send it to Apple for me. I'm sure 99% of the people on HN, if you'd told them 10-15 years ago that's what their phone would be doing by default in 2021, they'd have laughed at you and called you delusional. Or asked which dystopian scifi writer came up with that insane plot device.

bigiain 5y ago

I was responding to the last sentence: "If Apple is using iPhones to pair location and MAC addresses of nearby devices, that is indeed "location being tracked by other people's iPhones"." My AirTags have their "location being tracked by other people's iPhones". Sure - if we believe Apple (and I mostly do here) that their protocol and encryption works the way they describe, and that there's no bugs or back doors - then the only person who get to see my AirTag's location is me. But that still means "And Apple have clearly decided that’s ok" that my AirTags have their "location being tracked by other people's iPhones". They're selling me products on the assumption that your iPhone (and everybody else's, or at least enough other iPhone owners to make it useful) will happily listen out for bluetooth signals from AirTags, power up their GPS to get a current location, encrypt a bunch of data, then use your cellular data plan to send it to Apple for me. I'm sure 99% of the people on HN, if you'd told them 10-15 years ago that's what their phone would be doing by default in 2021, they'd have laughed at you and called you delusional. Or asked which dystopian scifi writer came up with that insane plot device.