ElevationLab has released an AirTag product I find appalling, and I strongly urge they immediately withdraw it from sale and recall all inventory. The AirTag Silencer is a simple device: remove the back panel and battery from an AirTag, position the Silencer’s highly engineered pin over the speaker, tap the pin with a hammer, and the AirTag’s speaker is destroyed. This prevents it from emitting an alert in three circumstances, only one of which is triggered by an owner. The other two scenarios aid stalkers and perpetrators of domestic violence, among others. I will not link to it.
I particularly appreciated the comments from Eva Galperin, Director of Cybersecurity at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, who said, “Honestly, this is just another example of the mindset that things are more important than people.” And in the context of disabling unidentified AirTags or other trackers you discover traveling with you, she drily noted, “I think that encouraging people to hit their AirTags with a hammer is a fine idea. They may need to hit it several times.”
Oh, the irony! There is ZERO information on Elevation Lab’s website about its founders, its current owners, its management, and its funders. I guess the “safety and security” pitch doesn’t extend to the company itself. The usual search strategies surface stuff fairly easily but all the secrecy is disturbing for a company jumping on the “perv-tech” trend.
ETA: I hope Apple uses its leverage over Elevation Lab—it has at least one product sold at Apple Stores—to force Elevation to stop selling the AirTag Silencer.
I think the speaker was the least effective of the anti-stalking features that Apple has added (it can be muffled easily and in version 1, can be hard to hear anyway). The phone (now also on Android) notice is the most effective feature, and isn’t deactivated by this action. Doesn’t help you find it once you’ve been alerted, though. This does help when AirTags are used for pets.
I have older vehicles that are not connected to the internet. I have AirTags in each of them so I can track the vehicles should they ever get stolen. The first thing an experienced thief will do is cause the AirTag to emit noise, find it, then ditch it. I disabled the speaker in each of the AirTags to make things more difficult for the thief. The instructions for doing so are easy to find on YouTube.
This is a case of me tracking my vehicle with my AirTag. AirTags can be used for great purposes like finding my suitcase as it moves through the airline system, or tracking my stolen car. They can also be used by bad actors to do bad things. A kitchen knife can be used to make dinner or commit murder. Like almost all technology, AirTags are morally neutral. The focus should be on the act, not the technology.