Apple’s AirTags are excellent devices that can help locate lost items, recover stolen cars, track lost luggage and much more. Did you know they can also help you save money?
A builder left the car keys
on the dashboard and the vehicle was promptly stolen
British builder Paul Conway told local news site Leeds Live that at Christmas his wife bought four AirTags for their keys. He decided to leave one in his Nissan Pathfinder SUV to use in case he forgot where he had parked it.
Months later, an employee who was using the car told him the vehicle had been stolen. Conway said:
I started shaking, I couldn’t believe it, because the car is my pride and joy.
He continued:
I was just sitting there shaking and then remembered I had the AirTag in my car, so I went into the app and saw the car was leaving Leeds for Bradford.
He followed the AirTag signal and called the police, who helped him find the car
Conway said:
We followed the signal and called the police, who offered to take me and go look for it.
It was hidden on a quiet residential street. Conway had an extra reason to retrieve the AirTag. He said:
I knew the employee had left the keys on the seat, so it wouldn’t have been insured. So if I hadn’t managed to get it back, I would have been furious because it wouldn’t have been covered by insurance.
A 35$ AirTag saved Conway from the cost of replacing his SUV, which would have been at least $35,000
Since their launch in 2021, Apple’s AirTags have proven to be a revolutionary device that saves money, recovers stolen cars and tracks lost luggage, among other uses. They have also been used for stalking, but Apple built in anti-stalking measures at launch, bringing attention to worrying situations. Competing tracking devices went a long time without anti-stalking protection, but even those are now being updated. Alongside greater awareness, Apple has continuously added more safeguards.
Many builders said they will order them.
Conway says he has become an advocate for AirTags since the incident. He says that, as a result of his experience, a scaffolding company in the UK now offers free AirTags to its customers.
This is not the first case where an AirTag led to the recovery of a stolen car, and it is not the first time this happened with an SUV. In January 2024, a driver found his stolen GMC Yukon XL in Toronto. About 6,000 kilometres later, it was back in Belgium. Paul Conway’s Nissan Pathfinder was apparently taken only eight kilometres by comparison.
