<story><title>I used Apple AirTags, Tiles and a GPS tracker to watch my husband’s every move</title><url>https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/11/technology/airtags-gps-surveillance.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>technothrasher</author><text>&amp;gt; Checking in constantly. Wondering and&amp;#x2F;or quizzing their child&lt;p&gt;This behavior is rampant in my peer group.  Most of my friends&amp;#x2F;neighbors are constantly monitoring their teen age children&amp;#x27;s location, reading their recent calls, texts, and emails, looking at internet usage logs, etc.  One of my neighbors even calls her daughter every time she sees she&amp;#x27;s driving over the speed limit and yells at her. It all seems so creepy to me, and I give my kid way more privacy than that, but it looks like I&amp;#x27;m in the minority of parents.</text></item><item><author>kbos87</author><text>My comment isn’t specific to AirTags, but there’s a much larger conversation that needs to be had about this gray area of stalking capabilities that are now built into many mainstream products.&lt;p&gt;Here’s a pattern I’ve seen play out more than once among friends and family - they share their location willingly and for seemingly benign reasons. It’s helpful to know when you’ll be getting home so I can start dinner! Just in case something happens to you! This is the innocent end of the spectrum; subtle or outright coercion in a controlling relationship is the darker end of the spectrum.&lt;p&gt;How it starts really doesn’t matter, because the truth is that even among otherwise well meaning and well intentioned people, tracking tech can turn them obsessive. Checking in constantly. Wondering and&amp;#x2F;or quizzing their child, partner or friend about what they were doing at location X.&lt;p&gt;The truth is that most people aren’t immune to being on either end of a situation like this, and the negative outcomes can range from feeling like your everyday movements are under a microscope, to outright abusive behavior more easily taken to the extreme.&lt;p&gt;I don’t claim that there are simple solutions here, but a starting point would be tech companies making it easier to see an audit of how this “innocent” tracking tech is being used on the trackee. For example, I bet my grandpa would think twice about checking in on my cousins location as often as he probably does if he knew that my cousin got a notification every time he checked in.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>franga2000</author><text>Holy shit what happened to &amp;quot;have fun, just be back by dinner time&amp;quot;? I&amp;#x27;m not that far from my teenage years so the fact that this is already happening to today&amp;#x27;s teens is a bit terrifying to me. We had cellphones back then and I had an early smartphone (Nokia N95 - anyone remember those?) when at least half my school didn&amp;#x27;t even have a brickphone, so the capability was there. Bot neither my parents nor the parents of any of my peers ever used it, even later when all of us had proper smartphones with parental control options only a few clicks away.&lt;p&gt;So what happened? Crime rates are down, kinds these days do drugs and drink at lower rates than back then, I can&amp;#x27;t remember the last time I heard of a kid go missing... We now have many privacy-preserving options for emergency tracking so there&amp;#x27;s less of a reason for total control than ever. Even monitoring Internet usage - there are fewer &amp;quot;predators&amp;quot; out there and kids are better at recognising and avoiding them than ever. I don&amp;#x27;t get it.</text></comment>
<story><title>I used Apple AirTags, Tiles and a GPS tracker to watch my husband’s every move</title><url>https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/11/technology/airtags-gps-surveillance.html</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>technothrasher</author><text>&amp;gt; Checking in constantly. Wondering and&amp;#x2F;or quizzing their child&lt;p&gt;This behavior is rampant in my peer group.  Most of my friends&amp;#x2F;neighbors are constantly monitoring their teen age children&amp;#x27;s location, reading their recent calls, texts, and emails, looking at internet usage logs, etc.  One of my neighbors even calls her daughter every time she sees she&amp;#x27;s driving over the speed limit and yells at her. It all seems so creepy to me, and I give my kid way more privacy than that, but it looks like I&amp;#x27;m in the minority of parents.</text></item><item><author>kbos87</author><text>My comment isn’t specific to AirTags, but there’s a much larger conversation that needs to be had about this gray area of stalking capabilities that are now built into many mainstream products.&lt;p&gt;Here’s a pattern I’ve seen play out more than once among friends and family - they share their location willingly and for seemingly benign reasons. It’s helpful to know when you’ll be getting home so I can start dinner! Just in case something happens to you! This is the innocent end of the spectrum; subtle or outright coercion in a controlling relationship is the darker end of the spectrum.&lt;p&gt;How it starts really doesn’t matter, because the truth is that even among otherwise well meaning and well intentioned people, tracking tech can turn them obsessive. Checking in constantly. Wondering and&amp;#x2F;or quizzing their child, partner or friend about what they were doing at location X.&lt;p&gt;The truth is that most people aren’t immune to being on either end of a situation like this, and the negative outcomes can range from feeling like your everyday movements are under a microscope, to outright abusive behavior more easily taken to the extreme.&lt;p&gt;I don’t claim that there are simple solutions here, but a starting point would be tech companies making it easier to see an audit of how this “innocent” tracking tech is being used on the trackee. For example, I bet my grandpa would think twice about checking in on my cousins location as often as he probably does if he knew that my cousin got a notification every time he checked in.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>rootusrootus</author><text>Neurotic people are neurotic, they just use whatever tools are available to them.  I can locate my daughter, my son, my wife, and even my own mother if I want to.  I don&amp;#x27;t stalk them, ask questions about where they are going or where they have been, etc.  But if I need a little peace of mind, I know where my loved ones are.  We use the location &amp;amp; communication tools with respect, just like anything else.</text></comment>