Toronto Man Tracks His Stolen AirTag-Equipped SUV as it Travels to Dubai
Credit: Eddie PipocasToggle Dark Mode
A Toronto man had his SUV stolen for a second time, and even though the man had two AirTags secreted inside of it, they didn’t help him recover the vehicle. However, he did get to watch on the Find My app as the vehicle took a leisurely trip to Dubai.
As reported by Canada’s CBC News, Andrew, whose full name has been withheld for privacy, had his first SUV stolen from his home in Toronto in May 2023. Following the subsequent purchase of a 2022 GMC Yukon XL, he secreted two, count ’em two, AirTags inside the SUV.
However, after returning from an August 2023 vacation, thieves hijacked that vehicle. But no fear, he had two AirTags in the vehicle, police found it easily, arrested the perpetrators and all was well again, right? Right?
Well…
Andrew contacted police, gave them his AirTag information, then sat back and watched as his Yukon XL made the circuit around the city of Toronto, eventually ending up in a railway yard.
While police were able to track the SUV to a specific shipping container in a railway yard, they claimed they did not have the authority to open the shipping container, referring Andrew to the railway yard’s private security team, who reportedly did nothing to assist in recovering the vehicle.
The SUV continued to see the world, as it made its way via train to the Port of Montreal, where it boarded a cargo ship. Andrew lost track of his SUV once the ship left the port, as the AirTags stopped reporting the location of the Yukon. This is likely due to the AirTag’s not having access to an iPhone connected to the internet.
However, in early September, Andrew finally saw an update on the SUV’s location, which turned out to be an Antwerp, Belgium shipping port. It turns out that wasn’t the vehicle’s final destination, though. It was actually headed to a location that was a bit warmer and a bit more sandy.
The vehicle finally came to rest in the United Arab Emirates, more than 6,800 miles (11,000km) away from Toronto. A private investigator sent Andrew a photo of his SUV, which was up for sale in a Dubai used car lot.
At the time of this writing, the car remains on the used car lot — no word on the asking price.
“We’ve done everything we possibly can save going over there and trying to take it back ourselves,” Andrew said in an interview. “I want my truck back.”
As CBC notes, Canada is currently in the throes of an auto theft epidemic. Meanwhile, Andrew’s AirTag-equipped Yukon XL gave Canadian police a rare look at the shipping route used by thieves to “export” stolen vehicles.
This latest report echoes two similar stories we reported on in June 2022. In the first, a Toronto man had his Range Rover stolen with three AirTags hidden inside. The thieves found a single “decoy” AirTag but missed the other two, and the story had a happy ending, as the owner was able to use Find My to locate his vehicle to an industrial location in Scarborough on the east side of Toronto, where police were able to recover it.
However, a few months before that, the Toronto Star’s Chief Investigative Reporter, Kevin Donovan, had his Toyota Highlander stolen from his driveway (Apple News+). No AirTags were involved, but police did eventually track the vehicle to Halifax, Nova Scotia, where it was found in a massive container ship with 29 other vehicles — also destined for Dubai.
The Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) says it recovered 1,806 stolen vehicles in 2023, an impressive 34 percent increase from 2022.
Canadian police are not the only police force dealing with a rash of car thefts. In November, Washington D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser launched a program to hand out AirTag to residents of automobile theft-prone D.C. neighborhoods, with the hope of the AirTags and the Find My App assisting in locating stolen vehicles. This followed the announcement of a similar program in May by New York City Mayor Eric Adams.
Police departments around the US have been vocal in urging users of AirTags and other tracking tiles to not physically pursue or confront bad guys by tracking a stolen item via the tracker, as it could result in injury or even death.
