Quote:
Originally Posted by anamardoll
The Apple employee did NOT have a GPS device attached to the missing phone that led them to this guy's house. If he HAD, a warrant would have been no problem to obtain.
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He did, actually - from the SF Weekly story: "A Bernal Heights man says that six officials claiming to be San Francisco Police officers questioned him and searched his family’s home in July for a lost iPhone 5 prototype they asserted had been traced to the residence using GPS technology."
All current iPhones have that functionality, too.
To get a search warrant, you need probable cause that you will find evidence connected with the commission of a crime. The GPS track should, IMO, provide probable cause that the iPhone is in the house...but I'm not sure what evidence there is that the iPhone was actually stolen. (There may be some; I just haven't read what it was). You can't get a search warrant to search for an item that isn't connected with a crime, so that may be why they held back.
Additionally, while the story indicates that the phone was tracked to that house, it doesn't indicate whether the phone was still broadcasting its location when they arrived - the program doesn't work (I believe) if the phone is actually turned off.
Here's a link to an interesting story about tracking stolen phones:
http://www.portlandtribune.com/news/...72295325979600
The coolest bit is where the deputy tracks the location and finds 3 men sitting under a tree, and then the owner (in another state), triggers an alert that causes the stolen phone to beep in one of the guy's pockets.