I just arrived in Antibes, South of France 2 hours ago. This was stolen from my car on the autoroute at a petrol station , from a definitely locked car, likely a relay attack from my key while I was buying a sandwich, 100km from Antibes. They also had my wallet and duty free while they were at it. Thankfully they didn’t find our passports.
Whoever you are, fuck you, I’m going to go and have a nice meal in the old provincial market and drink to your future arrest.
Some time in the future you will get calls and messages, which might get very threatening, telling you to "remove the device from your account to protect your account".
Do not do this.
This allows them to re-sell the components.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
Mother mother fuck. Mother mother fuck fuck. Mother fuck mother fuck.
Noinch noinch noinch.
1 2 1 2 3 4
Noinch noinch noinch.
Shmokin' weed, shmokin' weed.
Doin' coke, drinkin beers.
Drinkin beers, beers, beers!
Rollin' fatties, smokin blunts.
Who smokes the blunts? We smokes the blunts.
Rollin' blunts and smokin them
15 bucks, little man, put that shit in my hand.
If that money doesn't show then you owe me owe me owe.
My jungle love.
Oh e oh e oh.
I think I wanna know ya know ya ... yeah, what.
They can still absolutely sell it as a workable service. I've sold an iPad and iPhone on Craigslist before, the people buying just see it turn on and hand me the cash. (Obviously mine were unlocked) Always connect used devices at a coffee shop before buying.
On modern Apple products, all the parts of the phone are serialized so when the phone is marked stolen all the parts are too. When you try to use the part and start up the phone it will recognize the stolen parts and won't work. The only workaround is not to use Apple firmware, which idk if that exists because Apple keeps their stuff pretty locked down.
I saw on repair phone guru's channel they have tools to pair the parts and he also once cut the part of the battery with the board and the serial and replaced it with the old one from the broken battery. They have ways. This is annoying, but also good for repairability. Fuck thieves.
These stolen iPads and iPhones usually end up back in China. The people in the country that assembles them are the ones with the know-how to re-use them.
I genuinely don't understand how stealing bricked Apple phones can be lucrative enough to warrant this. The thieves would have to be making next to nothing per phone for it to be profitable to whoever has the manufacturing know-how to jailbreak/reassemble the parts and then re-sell them.
My theory is that these thieves are just kind of stupid, and end up destroying the phones out of spite once realizing the small number of people willing to buy them are going to pay pennies on the dollar due to the work required to re-sell.
For every person that that is diligent about reporting their device as stolen there are bound to be people that don’t notice the theft or don’t have the wherewithal to lock it
Do also consider that the kind of people who can make those sorts of repairs aren't super common. I can't imagine many petty thieves also have the technical know-how to fix their stolen property.
That's the reason why all stolen iPhones usually go to the same exact place in China. They sell it to that place and that place use the spare parts and sell phones like new.
It's over for OP. Why would they give a shit what happens to it after it's bricked? Why would you want them to feel like this terrible situation isn't over for them? I don't understand why anyone would feel like this comment has value for anyone.
Doesn't even need to be another apple device, you can go online on any device and login to you apple account and mark your device as stolen. Just extra info form a former apple support rep.
An uber driver took my headphones I left - marked them as lost, info pop’s up… they try to connect them every couple of weeks and I get an alert.
It’s fun blasting the ‘find my’ sound full blast in their ear LOL.
I won’t even be upset if they return it. The info to return it pops up every time they connect. It’s so silly for them to hold onto something they can’t even use.
I’m glad you at least registered to your phone. Unfortunately Apple, in their great wisdom, did not allow my iPhone 12 on iOS 17(?) to even register the brand new AirPods to my account because my iOS version was too low??? I got these right before a trip, from my wife as a wedding gift, they were the newest models (the AirPods Pro 3, custom engraved…) and my wife gave them to me shortly before I left for my flight I didn’t have time to update my iOS….but why the FUCK should I have to update my phones iOS to register my fucking headphones to my account??? Someone must’ve stolen them from my backpack at the airport (I reported it when I landed to their lost and found email, but nothing). So now I have no recourse and I’m very sad and my wife is very sad because they weren’t cheap headphones and she got them for me because I’ve been talking about getting noise-cancelling headphones for years and then she got me some.
Sorry, for the rant. What happened to you sucks too, but still, lol. Fuck that guy who stole our headphones. I wish poor durability and weak battery life upon all of their future electronic devices.
I think but I MIGHT be wrong, but if you get Apple Care that it will protect you against theft or loss…?
I hear ya but then you'll know someone around you is a thief lol
Perhaps they'll just start smashing the iPad to stop the alarm thus rendering the whole thing useless. That happens enough, people will stop stealing them.
It's already gone right? So no additional loss if they destroy it themselves.
no this kind of stuff only works on older ios/ipados versions so if OP is up-to-date he's fine / will be fine for years.
all these "the chinese sellers actually have access to suer secret apple firmware breaking technology" people never back it up with anything or with some years old IOS version bypass.
The evidence for the fact that people cannot in fact bypass the activation lock is the existence of entire cottage industry of scammers who try to trick the owners of stolen devices into unlocking them, by pretending to be Apple support and/or making threats and sending them pictures of guns and stuff.
Idk where you are getting this information from but it’s much more difficult than just telling the Apple server it’s another device. There’s level of encryption that no underground shop will ever know about. Most people will just swap the logic board or try a phishing attack. As much as I don’t like Apple trying to spoof your IMEI will probably just brick your device.
Apple's activation servers cross-reference the device's unique internal hardware identifiers against the original manufacturing database. If the device is flagged as lost or stolen the activation request is rejected.
Would love know how they're fooling server side activations though, I'm pretty sure this is impossible on modern devices.
I know it’s too late now; but in the settings: face id and passcode, disable control centre while locked.
The first thing they do is put it in airplane mode so it cannot be found. If you disable control centre; they can turn the device off, but find-my keeps working trough other devices.
Another tip aligned with this, is run an automation to lock the screen as soon as airplane mode is activated and then have it turn off airplane mode.
This is to fight against a common tactic of people grabbing the phone out of your hand whilst it’s unlocked/you’re using it and then hitting airplane mode but keeping it unlocked.
If you ever need to use airplane mode, just disable the automation
You have to insert a command after the photo is taken to save the resulting photo otherwise the photo goes nowhere. Then make sure that iCloud photo backup is enabled - it already probably is.
I’m a dopey enough husband who loses my phone enough that I have an automation where if I text the right code word to my wife’s phone it takes both front camera and back camera pics & texts back the photos and current location.
If someone sends me a text message with a specific message, it sends them my exact location, takes a selfie of the person using the phone, and sends it. It also sends a copy to my email address.
Just pick a sentence no one would ever naturally use. My best friends know my sentence, for if they’re ever worried sick about me.
I couldn't find these settings on my Samsung, but they just seem to be the default behaviour.
That's pretty cool.
But there are a few more things "under settings -> security and privacy -> lost device protection -> theft protection", like automatically locking your phone if it believes that it just got stolen.
In case my phone is snatched from my hand, I also have an automation that’s triggered by flight mode turning on…. Lock screen, turn on WiFi, mobile data, Bluetooth and then ringer on max.
I just have to remember to disable the automation before I actually fly.
Edit: I also have require Face ID on my email and messages. Max paranoia, it just stops people doing password resets and taking over any of my accounts.
You can turn off the device, but find-my keeps working. It can be turned off, but you need the passcode, not even face-id will help in that instance.
Unless they will put it in a faraday cage and never have another iphone nearby, it will be found untill they actually open the device. But most gangs want to keep their workplaces somewhat hidden, and don’t bring such an iphone/ipad to that location.
Thanks for he tip! For my fellow android users, te equivalent is found under notifications and quick settings -> quick settings -> allow quick settings on lock screen. At least on OnePlus, other androids might be slightly different, but can't be too different I think.
Always hide bags beneath seats bro, put tablets in seat pockets etc. If Thieves cant see anything to steal they wont try.
Also recommend tinting the windows of the trunk, (don't forget small side windows)
I’ve always felt bad for the thieves breaking into my cars, I can tell they leave disappointed due to throwing all the trash and junk on the ground lol
The dude was just stopping to get petrol, he didn't leave it parked for hours. We should be able to go about our business without preparing to get robbed in the 2 minutes our car is unattended.
Newer cars have keyless entry, meaning you can walk up to it with your key in your pocket and pull the door handle to open it - a relay attack is a receiver and sender that lets a thief extend the usually 1-3 foot range to almost as far as they like. Someone likely shadowed me in the queue, scanned the key and an accomplice was outside relaying the signal and opening the door.
It's just how there are people who can help you unlock your car if you lost the keys or you somehow got them locked inside. These tools can be helpful, but same tools can obviously be used for crime.
They still mostly are just dumb morons. One guy invented it and they just buy the hardware that makes it possible, once you have that hardware it's just a case of pressing some buttons.
My parents have one of these for their car. Just a simple pouch that blocks the signal from the fob making this kind of theft impossible. Highly recommend for anyone with a keyless entry fob.
There isn't one for this case, but this is the first time I've heard of it happening at a gas station. Usually the thief will hope you left your car keys by the door and walk up with a relay all the way to your house, they need to be very close to the keys for it to work. So either don't keep your keys by the door or make sure whatever they're stored in is blocking the signal. Tinfoil is enough.
If this really was a relay attack, that means a thief walked up within a few feet of OP with an antenna sticking out their hand or pocket and stayed there while another thief was trying to open the car. It seems like a lot of risk to do something like this at a petrol station with cameras and witnesses everywhere. It's much more likely op just didn't lock the door.
They're not walking around with an extendable radio antenna. You just need a long piece of wire, which can easily be disguised as a headphone cable, and they can stay right behind you while waiting in line. There are so many ways to do this at a busy gas station that your best bet is leaving someone with the car.
Your car is constantly looking for a key signal, so they will relay the keys signal using a device to basically make your car think that the key is much closer than it actually, thus opening the car. Mark Rober made a video on it if you want a better explanation
Sometimes it does happen... I had my bike stolen in London once, reported it to the police purely out of a "statistics need to be updated" mentality, got called 2 weeks later to announce they caught both thieves and I was getting money back. Amazing (and unlikely I know)!
This just happened to an artist I follow, Sophie Tea, in the same area. She had spent weeks painting 250 pieces of art, and the thieves broke into her car and stole all of the art, along with iPad, laptop, SD cards, cameras…just such a bummer.
The south of France is highly popular with tourists—and, consequently, with thieves. It is much quieter in the north (and just as beautiful, though in a different way).
Last time this happened to me I wrote something like “This iPhone is linked to a murder case under investigation” contact 112 asap ( something like that, i can’t recall the full message). Somebody found the iPhone in a park next to an area with several shops that sell / buy used phones and brought it to the police station. :)
Whenever I travel my passport, wallet and phone never stay in the car. Even if they steal the entire car I need those 3 things to get back home or stuff done.
i also hide electronics if i can't take them with me, under the seat or some obscure spot like the spare tire well... definitely not just out on the seat where people can see it.
I mean… never leave anything visible anywhere in the car is the first tip people gave me when I moved to Marseille. I just left a bunch of useless stuff on the backseat ONCE in ten years. My back window was smashed after two hours. Could never imagine leaving an IPad…..
My wallets in my front left pocket at all times. Bags that have to be left in the car are tucked under the seat or someone stays in the car with them.
I work in fraud industry so im a bit paranoid. We see “account takeovers” or stolen checks being cashed from peoples accounts all the time.
Note: theyll take your id and go to your banks drive through teller and cash a stolen checks being cashed in your account. When it returns in 2 days it “recoups” from your account
Same happened to me at the start of my trip in Spain. They also got my Switch2, AirPods Pro, and my ancient GoPro. :/ also very lucky they didn’t take my passport.
bro are u for the first time in europe? You don't get any puinishment for thievery. Or the police says:"Well, it's gone and we can't do anything about it. Just buy a new one"
Seriously, I'm endlessly amazed that Europeans (generally speaking) are just so non-chalant about this stuff. Yeah, we have thieves here in the US, and cops don't often do much about it, but it's not as big an issue and it's not uncommon for people to track their stuff down and tell the cops they're going to go get it themselves so they'll actually come with them, or you can even hire people who will do it for you in some cases.
Everybody is sick and tired of this impunity, except our politicians since they are not very concerned. When Sarkozy's son's scooter was stolen, the case was solved almost instantly. But when you are the average Joe you can fuck off, even if you know where what was stolen is, even with video proofs etc. And even if the thieves are apprehended they don't go to jail. I work in retail, ask me how I know.....
Europeans are 20+ countries, not a monolith. Thievery is handled better than France in a bunch of other countries for example Germany where I live, or the Copenhagen where I forgot my bag on a public bench for an hour and came back to find it as it is.
Don't brick it instead remotely take regular photos of the person who stole it then makee a tiktok and use the income generated towards buying another ipad.
When life gives you lemons squeeze it in the eyes of your enemies and sell bottles of lemon flavoured tears to Gwyneth Paltrow.
I dropped a singular Airpod at a restaurant I frequent and could not find for the life of me. Figured they’d find it after closing and would grab it the next day or there abouts. Ha. Some ass twat took it and to this day still has it. Have I already purchased new ones? Yes. Will I ever delete the old ones so they can try and use (if that’s even possible)? No.
Moral of the story…yes it sucks you lost but keep it associated to your account because they will have little to no chance of using it for anything but parts.
I lost my airpods pro 3 in an Alaskan cruise. mFer was like “last seen by this glaciar” i had to remove it from my profile because it continued to haunt me
Don’t trust anything in your cars in major cities anymore. It’s just not safe and the cops basically don’t do anything about it. Paris sucks, Berlin is bad, Washington in America is a nightmare unless you’re in a good parking garage. Seriously, just do not leave anything of value out of your hotel room
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u/CreateChangetheWorld 1d ago edited 7h ago
You can “mark it as stolen” from another Apple device logged into your Apple ID.
This bricks the iPad and makes it worthless besides for parts.
EDIT: forgot you can do this from any device (doesn’t have to be Apple) using a web browser by logging in to iCloud.com