Lufthansa Says Passengers Can't Use Apple AirTags to Track Checked Bags (nytimes.com) 72
UPDATE: Lufthansa has since reversed their position, and now says Apple AirTags "are allowed on Lufthansa flights, according to SFGate. But only after their earlier remarks stirred up a lot of consternation.
Slashdot's original story appears below:
Citing rules issued by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), German airliner Lufthansa says it is banning activated Apple AirTags from luggage "as they are classified as dangerous and need to be turned off." Slashdot reader AmiMoJo first shared the news with us. The New York Times reports: Lufthansa, a German airline, set off confusion recently after telling passengers that they could not use trackers like Apple AirTags in checked baggage because of international guidelines for personal electronic devices. Apple rejected that interpretation on Tuesday, saying its trackers comply with all regulations. It does not appear that any other airlines are requiring passengers to turn off the trackers, which have become popular as a way to find lost baggage.
Lufthansa found itself in the middle of the issue when reports surfaced in the German news media that the devices were prohibited. Though Lufthansa said it has no desire to prohibit the devices that it deemed safe, the airline seems to have stepped in a mess based on the reading of obscure international guidelines and regulations, with no clear consensus on what is and is not allowed in Europe.
Lufthansa said on Sunday on Twitter that the trackers must be deactivated in checked baggage on its flights, citing the International Civil Aviation Organization's guidelines for dangerous goods as well as the trackers' "transmission function." Shutting off the trackers renders them useless. The airline has not issued a specific policy prohibiting baggage trackers. Rather, it says it is at the mercy of the rules. On Tuesday, the airline said it was "in close contact with the respective institutions to find a solution as quickly as possible." It also indicated its own examination saw no danger from their use. "The Lufthansa Group has conducted its own risk assessment with the result that tracking devices with very low battery and transmission power in checked luggage do not pose a safety risk," said Martin Leutke, a Lufthansa spokesman. "We have never issued a ban on devices like that. It is on the authorities to adapt regulations that right now limit the use of these devices for airline passengers in checked luggage."
In its statement, Apple said that AirTags are "compliant with international airline travel safety regulations for carry-on and checked baggage."
Slashdot's original story appears below:
Citing rules issued by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), German airliner Lufthansa says it is banning activated Apple AirTags from luggage "as they are classified as dangerous and need to be turned off." Slashdot reader AmiMoJo first shared the news with us. The New York Times reports: Lufthansa, a German airline, set off confusion recently after telling passengers that they could not use trackers like Apple AirTags in checked baggage because of international guidelines for personal electronic devices. Apple rejected that interpretation on Tuesday, saying its trackers comply with all regulations. It does not appear that any other airlines are requiring passengers to turn off the trackers, which have become popular as a way to find lost baggage.
Lufthansa found itself in the middle of the issue when reports surfaced in the German news media that the devices were prohibited. Though Lufthansa said it has no desire to prohibit the devices that it deemed safe, the airline seems to have stepped in a mess based on the reading of obscure international guidelines and regulations, with no clear consensus on what is and is not allowed in Europe.
Lufthansa said on Sunday on Twitter that the trackers must be deactivated in checked baggage on its flights, citing the International Civil Aviation Organization's guidelines for dangerous goods as well as the trackers' "transmission function." Shutting off the trackers renders them useless. The airline has not issued a specific policy prohibiting baggage trackers. Rather, it says it is at the mercy of the rules. On Tuesday, the airline said it was "in close contact with the respective institutions to find a solution as quickly as possible." It also indicated its own examination saw no danger from their use. "The Lufthansa Group has conducted its own risk assessment with the result that tracking devices with very low battery and transmission power in checked luggage do not pose a safety risk," said Martin Leutke, a Lufthansa spokesman. "We have never issued a ban on devices like that. It is on the authorities to adapt regulations that right now limit the use of these devices for airline passengers in checked luggage."
In its statement, Apple said that AirTags are "compliant with international airline travel safety regulations for carry-on and checked baggage."
This has nothing to do with safety (Score:5, Insightful)
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Yep, exactly this. The airline even acknowledged they performed safety testing and found these devices to be of no safety risk. Fucking bureaucrats.
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Re: This has nothing to do with safety (Score:2)
I think Luftwaffe is just looking for a reason to send the Schutzstaffel.
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"safety" is often cited when the actual issue is "We don't want you to be able to prove we're doing our jobs badly."
I personally think this is brilliant. Apple's air-tags have the huge benefit of being able to ping (anonymously) off other people's iPhones, so if your luggage goes the wrong way, it's pretty likely to keep updating online due to random passers-by with iphones (again, anonymously) updating the online geolocation history of the tags.
They do this tag-to-phone communications entirely over blueto
Re: This has nothing to do with safety (Score:2)
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Maybe they should mandate/provide a tracker on every piece of luggage so they can track it themselves and mitigate these issues instead of hiding them.
Re:This has nothing to do with safety (Score:5, Interesting)
That is exactly the point - the fact that airlines will spend days searching for your bag claiming to not know where it is, when it's sitting at the departure airport.
Simple Flying said it best - Lufthansa is doing this because they're not customer friendly and want to hide when they're lost luggage.
https://simpleflying.com/lufth... [simpleflying.com]
Airlines are scared because they don't want people to know a good portion of "lost luggage" isn't - it's luggage that was offloaded so the airline could carry more valuable cargo. Airports have very sophisticated luggage routing systems - once it gets tagged into the system, the luggage will make its way through the various belts and ramps and arrive at the right area within 10 minutes of you checking it in.
Short of a mechanical fault in the system that randomly kicks luggage down the wrong ramp or fails to kick luggage around, the system is basically foolproof. I mean the luggage system scans each luggage tag, reads the barcode and routes it as needed, and to make sure the system scans the barcode as it as makes its way through the maze of belts and ramps and conveyors ensuring nothing has gone amiss. Should a luggage lose its tag, it gets kicked out for manual sorting and re-tagging (and the system generally knows because a piece of luggage stops getting scanned properly so you can make a reasonable guess). Though even more modern systems don't even use tags - the luggage ends up in a bin and the bin uses RFID to route it - so you have both the luggage barcode and the bin RFID to tag things together.
The only real way it gets "lost" is if at the end of the maze, the luggage handlers fail to load it onto the cart, or it fails to make it to the plane.
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Bags get tossed in the wrong cart at the end of those conveyors all the time. Like all the time. Sometimes full carts get sent to the wrong planes.
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And let's face it, there's still a lot of theft of luggage. This happened to two of my friends on a trip to Rome. We saw the bags being taken off the plane as we were waiting to disembark but then they miraculously went missing. Never to be seen again.
This is definitely a dick move by Lufthansa trying to avoid accountability for lost luggage. If they're that worried about the tags interfering with the plane's systems they could easily make the cargo hold a Faraday cage. If they need their own sensors i
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As I've been saying for years - if a small electronic device actually *can* take down a plane then we need to fix that problem. The fact that nobody seems keen to do so means they know that these devices can't actually interfere with a plane.
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Anecdote: I once needed to fly to Warsaw and had to use Lufthansa. Their alleged booking software had me flying to a German airport and then changing flights. So they flew me into one end of the German airport that was undergoing renovation, and had me hoof it to the other end going through check out and thence check in again. They gave me 1/2 hr to do it. I missed the connecting flight and when I approached the agent at the desk where the flight had already flown, what I got was a steely stare and a demand
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Anecdote: I once needed to fly to Warsaw and had to use Lufthansa. Their alleged booking software had me flying to a German airport and then changing flights. So they flew me into one end of the German airport that was undergoing renovation, and had me hoof it to the other end going through check out and thence check in again. They gave me 1/2 hr to do it. I missed the connecting flight and when I approached the agent at the desk where the flight had already flown, what I got was a steely stare and a demand to know why I was there since the flight had already left.
Passengers are merely cattle to them running their airline. My luggage did make the connecting flight.
Usually these demented connecting flights are what you get when you go for the absolutely cheapest alternative. I'm not in the habit of overpaying for airline tickets but I will pay extra for fewer connections, not having to fetch the bags and re-check them in at connecting airports myself and generally speaking I'm going to reject any connecting flight with a layover of less than 2 hours after a trans-Atlantic flight chewed up 35 minutes of a 1 hour layover at Copenhagen and I made the connection a literal
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Short of a mechanical fault in the system that randomly kicks luggage down the wrong ramp or fails to kick luggage around, the system is basically foolproof. I mean the luggage system scans each luggage tag, reads the barcode and routes it as needed, and to make sure the system scans the barcode as it as makes its way through the maze of belts and ramps and conveyors ensuring nothing has gone amiss.
I think you're overly optimistic and forget scale.
A "foolproof" system that makes almost no mistakes, say one in 100,000 - will still misplace luggage at a rate of a few every day at major airports.
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My local airport had a poster up, something along the lines of "40 million bags passed through the airport last year. 99.9% made it to their destination."
So they only lost forty thousand bags.
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That is exactly the point - the fact that airlines will spend days searching for your bag claiming to not know where it is, when it's sitting at the departure airport.
Not sure why you think these two things are at odds. When you need to find a bag it could be in any number of airports (departure airport, arrival airport, or incorrect airport, to say nothing of a bag checked through on multiple flights). Just because it is at the departure airport doesn't mean it doesn't legitimately take days to find it and doesn't mean that some company nefariously actually knows exactly where it is while not giving a damn.
Something is always somewhere. That doesn't mean it's lost. And
Re: This has nothing to do with safety (Score:2)
The guitar will still be broken and useless, tag or no tag.
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Fine (Score:1)
If you guys lose my luggage then you are liable times ten because I would have had a way to find it but you forced me to turn that off.
Suppsoedly This isn't true (Score:5, Interesting)
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So typical of the Germans... As the popular saying goes:
In Germany everything that is not allowed is forbidden.
In England everything is allowed that is not forbidden.
In France everything is allowed, even if it is forbidden.
and in Russia everything is forbidden, even if it is allowed.
simple solution (Score:1)
Re:simple solution (Score:5, Informative)
Re: simple solution (Score:1)
So Apple is forcing iPhones to act as a mesh network that no doubt reports back to Apple, correct?
Can't see anything wrong with that!
Helen, you are late (Score:2)
You are late to the topic. It has been discussed ad nausem.
And you obviously donâ(TM)t own an Apple device, because you could decide to keep the feature turned off, then.
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just disable Find my network (Score:2)
Just disable the find my network.
Of course then your devices are locked out of the service, too.
There is no leeching, which is very okay.
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So Apple is forcing iPhones to act as a mesh network that no doubt reports back to Apple, correct?
And iPads, and Macs. This makes Airtags incredibly efficient, and no one else than Apple can provide this today. For example, the case for Airpod Pros acts as an airtag, so you can locate it wherever it is. I suspect Apple pencils are next in line.
If you are the type of person that lose their keys or wallet from time to time, this is a lifesaving device.
Oldschool: Simply chain (Score:2)
If you are the type of person that lose their keys or wallet from time to time, this is a lifesaving device.
I've went for the old school method of having my keys attached to a chain whose other end is attached to me.
If my keys are lost, that implies that the chain is lost and also implies that I am lost too.
At which point I might be having bigger problem that can't necessarily be addressed with an AirTag.
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This also applies to wallet, and basically anything you want to locate easily. I also dropped two of them in my cars just in case. If they ever get stolen, I'll know where they are faster than the thief.
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It's a shame there is no open standard for this. Many phones now have Ultrawideband and Android has had an API for it for a while now.
The problem is the manufacturers. Apple, Samsung and Tile all refuse to interoperate or agree a common standard that would benefit every consumer.
It's also a safety issue. iPhones can detect when they are being tracked by hidden AirTags, but unless you download and manually run an app periodically most other phones do not. Without OS level integration it's going to be a batte
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Airtags do not use UWB for being located remotely. They are just a bluetooth beacon with some nifty crypto protocol.
UWB is only used to find them when they are a few meters from the iPhone they are bound to.
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True. Unfortunately there is no standard for registering detection of tracking tags, and all the different manufacturers have their own separate networks.
COVID tracing apps (Score:2)
Without OS level integration it's going to be a battery hog too, the same as attempts to build COVID tracing apps where.
...except that Apple and Google moved some DP-3T protocol code and integrated it into the OS.
So for the vast majority of the people, COVID tracing wasn't such a battery hog.
(But at the cost of using a non-opensource implementation of a tracking protocol.
Though if you're that scared of tracking and privacy violations, you have bigger problems.
Namely using a smartphone powered by Apple or Google).
Even the open source microG replacement for Google Play Services did integrate support for OS-level contact traci
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That's what I'm saying. It needs to be in the OS. Apps that tried to do their own thing, like the first British one, failed.
Airplane mode for a defined amount of time (Score:2)
They have GPS. Just turn off transmissions when moving more than 10mph. You can still track your bag, but it won't interfere with an operating airplane.
Airplane mode for a defined amount of time. Might as well do it for phones and watches too. Allow the user to turn on airplane mode for some period of time, when that period elapses airplane mode turns off automatically.
Five hour flight, turn it off for five and a half hours.
Be good little sheep... (Score:1, Funny)
Put on your mask, take your vaccine and turn off your trackers... unless it's on your phone and to track you.
Lost Luggage (Score:5, Insightful)
When I travelled recently and had to make a connecting flight, I knew there was a high likelihood that my luggage would get misplaced, mainly since local airlines have been struggling with post-COVID staff shortages and their processes seem to have fallen apart.
My bag didn't arrive at the destination, and I went to the help desk, the two separate groups of people behind me who were also missing their luggage knew exactly where the bags were thanks to their trackers, but the airline staff claimed their system couldn't locate them.
Airlines must hate it when their tracking systems are lightyears behind what the customer has.
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Airlines must hate it when their tracking systems are lightyears behind what the customer has.
I'm sure they do, but unless you want to literally double the cost of every piece of checked luggage (an air tag costs as much as a checked bag on a flight) that's the reality of a system that handles multiple millions of pieces of baggage every day, to say nothing of freight / commercial shipment.
Barcodes remain the lowest cost option. Bags getting lost are a relative rarity and not worth the cost of changing the entire system. Also this isn't something Airlines can do in isolation. They need the co-operat
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Airlines must hate it when their tracking systems are lightyears behind what the customer has.
I'm sure they do, but unless you want to literally double the cost of every piece of checked luggage (an air tag costs as much as a checked bag on a flight) that's the reality of a system that handles multiple millions of pieces of baggage every day, to say nothing of freight / commercial shipment.
Barcodes remain the lowest cost option. Bags getting lost are a relative rarity and not worth the cost of changing the entire system. Also this isn't something Airlines can do in isolation. They need the co-operation of the airports where they operate. No point in having an air-tag or NFC or any other more advanced technology if the only people who know how to use it is some pissed of customer standing at a service desk.
Sidenote: Do you have a Decathlon store (sports goods)? Here they've started replacing barcodes with NFC tags. At check out you just dump your entire shopping basket into a bucket and the machine lists all the times you have, no need to scan barcodes.
All true, but AirTags bloody work and I don't see why they should be banned. I've been able to retrieve a bag that an airline declared lost and wanted to pay out insurance for because I had put a pouch with an AirTag in it in the suitcase and was able to locate it. The damn bag ended up in a country I wasn't even transiting through.
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Instead of alienating users with Airtags, they should thank them and take into account the location reported by the AirTag. That would be a win-win instead of a lose-lose as they're trying to push it.
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Barcodes remain the lowest cost option.
Ultra-high frequency RFID tags could be made to work. According to Wikipedia, they cost 5 to 15 cents, and have a range up to 12 meters. They are designed for tracking inventory.
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Airlines must hate it when their tracking systems are lightyears behind what the customer has.
It's a double-edged sword. If I were a stressed-out worker at a lost luggage counter and a customer came to me and told me the bag I cannot find in my system was located 5 minutes ago sitting outside gate XXX at terminal YYY at ZZZ airport, I'd be happy of the time they could potentially save me by giving me a big hint as to the first place I'd call (if they don't just flag that baggage as lost and initiate a trace in the computer).
used Lufthansa and AirTags last summer (Score:3)
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but it sure is good having that option.
Why is it good? It will literally just frustrate you. Airports will do literally nothing with the information that you give them. The system tells them where they think the bag is and that's where they'll look. The only thing an airtag can do is piss you off knowing that the bag is either close by, or in a location where its not being looked for.
Ignorance is bliss in this matter. Luggage is rarely lost forever. Travel insurance is a far better option.
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but it sure is good having that option.
Why is it good?
Oh, luggage gets lost and when it does you can find it with those tags after the airline has given up. There is no earthly reason to ban those tags, ... unless they are planning to market an 'aviation safety rated' alternative tag that you can buy at 4 times the price of an Apple/Android tag.
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but it sure is good having that option.
Why is it good?
Oh, luggage gets lost and when it does you can find it with those tags after the airline has given up. There is no earthly reason to ban those tags, ... unless they are planning to market an 'aviation safety rated' alternative tag that you can buy at 4 times the price of an Apple/Android tag.
The preserve airline revenue stream they will not allow you to buy expensive airline-approved AirTag...only rent them for the duration of your travel on that airline.
After all...it's all about The BENJAMINS Baby!
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> Travel insurance is a far better option.
No. The better option is regulation.
Airlines should not be allowed to play these sorts of games with peoples' luggage. Even if insurance pays out the full replacement value (Yeah, right. What insurance company hs ever done that?) of whatever bag and contents goes missing, that still takes time. And meanwhile, you're off in some strange city... maybe some strange country... without the week or two worth of clothes, shoes, toiletries, maybe gifts if you were vi
Lufthansa huh? (Score:3)
They want to make it EASIER to heist someone's belongings.
Imagine my utter lack of surprise...
Take it away Joe Pesci!
Passenger demanded to leave before takeoff (Score:5, Interesting)
This held up the flight, the airline was fined for late departure, they had to rescan the bags etc etc
The airline wants you to fly, and deal with the late bag after.
Trackers are a good thing, in my opinion, it will help airlines make "better" choices for the passengers when before they didn't need to
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> The real reason here is a passenger demanded to
> leave a plane as their luggage was not stowed in the
> hold. This held up the flight, the airline was fined for
> late departure, they had to rescan the bags etc etc
And to that, I say: GOOD!!! The airline is the one that fucked up, and it DESERVES to be fined. It shouldn't be incumbent on the passenger to have to re-buy everything they needed for a 2-week vacation or whatever... plus replacing their luggage to take all the new clothes they sho
strange twist (Score:2)
Wasn't there news a few days ago that Lufthansa was embarrassed by passengers when the airline couldn't locate the lost luggage - but thanks to AirTags the passengers could?
(in other news, it seems LH has already reversed its policy)
No concerns about other Bluetooth devices? (Score:2)
They are only obeying orders (Score:2)
Streisand... paging Barbra Streisand... (Score:3, Insightful)
It seems awfully likely that Lufthansa intentionally "misinterpreted" some obscure regulation that they think will give them legal coverage, so that they don't have to continue answering to angry passengers telling them where the lost luggage is located. As usual, this is going to prompt exactly the kind of attention that Lufthansa was trying to forestall with their ill conceived ban in the first place, shining the proverbial spotlight in all the dark places. So yeah: good job Barbra... errr... Lufthansa. We appreciate your prompt actions in bringing this to our collective attention. (massive eyeroll)
The airline which will earn my respect will be the one which sees these trackers as an opportunity to excel, and starts directly soliciting passengers for their tracking information when luggage is misdirected. I mean, how easy would it be to just call up their sister airport to inform them of the issue, so that it can be remediated that much more quickly? In many cases, "We don't know where it is," followed by weeks of waiting could potentially be revised to, "Okay, Joe in Springfield has eyes on it -- it will be redirected post-haste and should be here tomorrow evening. We are sooooo sorry for the inconvenience!"
Not to give Apple Ideas but... (Score:2)
If the issue is transmitting while in flight, then Apple could create airtags with airplane mode, i.e. while in motion over a certain speed, they will not transmit their location, and they could be on a delayed timer so they don't start transmitting until well after the flight should have landed. As such, Luftansa wouldn't even be able to detect the tags until the bags are in a lost baggage room.
People with an opinion (Score:2)
> while in motion over a certain speed, they will not transmit their location
And how do you suggest the Airtag will know its speed?
Really, people
This is a problem with a technical solution (Score:2)
Just don't check luggage (Score:2)
I've flown all over the world for work and leisure and don't ever check luggage. I have a backpack style suitcase that is carry-on legal size. I've taken it on long duration business and leisure travel trips and never felt I needed a bigger bag. (I've even packed my scuba gear in it for trips to the South Pacific several times)
I don't know why people think they need to take so much stuff on trips. In addition to the hassle of checking and reclaiming bags with the chance they will be lost, having large suitc
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Why? Because not everyone is as robust and clever as you are.
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It doesn't take much brainpower to figure this out.
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How many kids do you have and how old are they?
Re: Just don't check luggage (Score:2)
If they're old enough to travel, they can carry their stuff. Our kids did.
They need even less stuff than adults.
I'm still waiting for.. (Score:2)
Airlines. Duh. (Score:2)
Why don't the airlines tag your bags with THEIR OWN air tags? ...That work with both their equipment and both Apple and Android devices?
You forgot the followup editor? (Score:2)
https://liveandletsfly.com/luf... [liveandletsfly.com]
https://twitter.com/ethanklapp... [twitter.com]
Actually, AirTags Are NOT Banned! (Score:2)
Lufthansa reversed their earlier announcement, after "Guidance" from Authorities.
Of course, Slashdot will NEVER Update their hand-wringing earlier story; but it's true:
https://www.macrumors.com/2022... [macrumors.com]