A Toronto man used an Apple AirTag device hidden inside his car to track his stolen SUV more than 6,800 miles around the world to a used car park in the Middle East.
The man and his wife returned home from vacation on the night of Aug. 7 to find someone had broken into his driveway and attempted to steal his 2022 GMC Yukon XL. CBC News reported.
The steering wheel, which had an anti-theft lock, was bent forward and the seat was pushed back.
After eating a quick dinner, I came out again 45 minutes later and the car was gone. It was the second car, the same model the criminals had stolen from the house in just four months.
A few weeks later, the vehicle somehow ended up in a used car park in Dubai.
“We did everything we could except go over there and try to get it back ourselves,” the car's owner told CBC. “I want my truck back.”
CBC News
Fearing retaliation from the robbers, the man, who only gave his name as Andrew, pulled out his smartphone and began tracking the SUV for hours as it drove through the Toronto metro area with an air tag hidden inside the vehicle.
He called police in Toronto and other areas to report the theft. Two days later, York police officers used the technology to trace the vehicle to a shipping container at a rail yard, but Andrew was told there was nothing they could do.
The officer suggested Andrew call Canadian Pacific Railway's civilian police, but police did not respond before the container was shipped.
“That's the culmination of the frustration. I know it's still there, but it's going away,” Andrew told CBC.
By August 11, the air tag was pinging from the Port of Montreal. Andrew alerted local authorities, but the air tag went silent for nearly a month, he told CBC.
On September 6, the air tag rang again across the sea at the Belgian port of Antwerp, Europe's busiest.
On September 26, the vehicle resurfaced at a port near Dubai, United Arab Emirates, more than 10,800 miles from the scene of the theft.
Andrew's father, a former lawyer, began researching ways to get his car back. According to CBC, the family hired a private investigator in the UAE to locate the SUV in a used car park in Dubai.
He sent a family photo with a car ID number visible through the windshield that matched the Yukon number that Andrew had stolen. Listed for $80,000
“The case remains active,” Toronto police said in a brief statement.
Stolen cars are an epidemic in Canada. The transatlantic route that Andrew's stolen car took to cross the world became popular among thieves.
Canada Border Services Agency [CBSA] The company told CBC it intercepted 1,806 stolen vehicles in 2023, an increase of 34% from the previous year.
Last year, New York City provided Apple AirTags to car owners in an effort to thwart the proliferation of carjackings in targeted areas of the city.
Apple and several law enforcement agencies advise car owners to report vehicle thefts to law enforcement rather than attempting to track down and confront car thieves themselves. According to AppleInsider.
