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You could try to get the police to do it, but that's going to take more time, during which the thief is even more likely to ditch the AirTag. During the most r

You could try to get the police to do it, but that's going to take more time, during which the thief is even more likely to ditch the AirTag. During the most recent American election I saw at least three news stories on television about campaign sign thieves being tracked down through the use of AirTags put in one of the signs. To my surprise, in each case the police were right there, and in two of the cases, the signs were still loaded in the thieves' cars. So it does seem to work. Anyway, you're really swimming upstream trying to think of aigtags as an antitheft device. They aren't anti-theft devices as in padlocks. But the more often that thieves start wondering if the thing they're taking might have an AirTag in it, they might start reconsidering some of the petty thefts. It's like a surveillance camera. A camera, itself, can't stop a crime. But the possibility that someone's watching can act as a mild deterrent.

HPsquared 2y ago
Aren't the news stories subject to survivorship bias though? They wouldn't be as likely to report a boring "sign stolen, thief unknown" story.
- reaperducer 2y ago
  Aren't the news stories subject to survivorship bias though? They wouldn't be as likely to report a boring "sign stolen, thief unknown" story. Not really. "Survivorship bias" is just the HN cliché of the quarter, and doesn't apply in nearly as many situations as posters on this forum would like. There were plenty of other stories of campaign signs being stolen, both in the most recent election, and in previous ones. I'd call it more "perception bias." You only know about the AirTag campaign signs stories because you're viewing it through the lens of HN, and not a broader view of media coverage of the issue.