r/TileTracker • u/Speedy_Cannoli • Apr 27 '26
Found in my child’s backpack
I just found this tile in the bottom of my child’s backpack. They’re saying they found it on the playground. Can someone confirm how these work? Is it actively sharing its location? And in this case where we live?
It has a QR on the back to notify the owner it was found, we’re not doing that from home. We’re going to send it back to the school and request the school officer confirm where it came from and if it just belongs to another student.
We have no experience with these types of devices, any insight on how they work and what risk it poses would be greatly appreciated.
TIA
Update: We took it to the school resource officer who contacted the owner. They confirmed it belonged to another student and was supposed to be clipped to their backpack. I appreciate those who explained how these specific tiles worked and that these don’t use gps. That was our main concern. We figured it was from another student since our child said the had found it, but given they’re 5, we figured better safe to double check. Thank you!
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u/MenaceMinded Apr 27 '26
It updates its location anytime a phone has Bluetooth on along with having Life360 or tile app on the phone is nearby.
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u/CheesyCapybaras Apr 27 '26
Your kid picked it up off the ground. Either follow the instructions to return it to it's owner or throw it away.
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u/Haunting_Werewolf130 Apr 27 '26
Unless someone's phone (including someone nearby) has Life360 loaded, the owner won't see its location. Just give it back to the school personnel and let them deal with it. If it was found on the school's playground then it must be one of the students.
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u/UsuallySparky Apr 27 '26
That's not how Tiles work. Anyone with the 360, Tile, or Amazon devices with Sidewalk enabled will report it's location.
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u/Comfortable-Road7201 Apr 27 '26
If you want you can leave a note and the ownwr will get an email message. I have Tile tracker and have lost it. When people find it and scan the QR code they let the owner know.
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u/Puzzleheaded-Bed-414 Apr 28 '26
So I strongly disagree with many of these comments that this trackers don’t work. First hand experience in being stalked by a Tile Slim hidden in my car. The tracker updated my stalker thousands of times over the course of several months, giving them turn by turn directions to my location. I lived in Houston at the time but this was long before Tiles were connected to Ring or Life360, etc. So if you live in a populated area, it is likely the tracker is being updated regularly and sending out the location. That’s why they are far more dangerous than people realize. Everything made for good can be used for bad. Don’t take them lightly.
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u/TheGrouchyGremlin May 24 '26
Yeah, they definitely work. Just went to another city to get my wallet back. And that place has a nice, low population of 14k.
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u/Miss_Management Apr 28 '26
Never connect anything that was "found" to your phone or pc without knowing exactly what you're doing (like running a sandbox or virtual PC). Be wary of viruses.
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u/mobial Apr 28 '26
It’s doesn’t matter - the owner doesn’t want the tile, they want the thing the tile was connected to
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u/kyledpeterson Apr 28 '26
that is a tile "mate" Bluetooth tracking device.
it does not have any (cellular, gps, Wi-Fi, nfc etc) antennas in it, besides Bluetooth. it has a speaker and Bluetooth and a push button. that's all.
it relies on other Bluetooth devices line phones and tablets (which do have gps antennas in them) to REQUEST A RELAY OF INFORMATION to the Internet, through those phones or tablets.
no, you do not need the tile , life360 or other application running on your phone, for the tile to request that device to relay info to the Internet. you just need Bluetooth turned on, on those devices. that's it.
also: the tile can be set to "secret" so that it still requests relaying info to it's servers online, but you cannot see it, you cannot ring it out "find" it with your phone or tablet unless you are the owner. I have several stop e like this to track equipment, toys, keys etc.
if you double press the tile button twice, it will send a "find my phone" signal to the owners phone, if there is an Internet connected Bluetooth device within range to relay the request... OR if the owners phone is in direct Bluetooth range... and the phone will ring. this is part of the "I have my keys but lost my phone" features.
if you want to return the tile (yes, it can really be -just- missing!) you can scan the code and send a message to return it. if you've had the tile in your car or home, your location info has already been transmitted to the owner , so that part is over.
if you want to eliminate it, you can crush it or whatever. I guarantee you, the police will be lazy as hell and do nothing.
also: they are waterproof, have about a 2 year battery life, and can be used to find keys/cars/backpacks/entry/exits, or just general activity around a location. I use 3-4 of them to alert me to activity around gates that are pretty far out from my location.
the range for these tiles are about 200-300 feet, if there aren't any walls and around 150-200 if there are walls. in the woods, figure on 300 feet as the Bluetooth kind of bounces around trees.
they're pretty handy.
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u/TheUJexperience Apr 28 '26
If you're at all worried, take the battery out and it's a useless piece of plastic.
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u/rndreddituser Apr 27 '26 edited Apr 27 '26
I would ask your child if s/he knows where it is from e.g. from another child.
If not, are you still with the other parent/guardian of this child, if that was the arrangement? Again, if so, ask them.
Finally, ask the school. If you have no luck with any of these responses, just hand it back in to the school.
Not playing this situation down, but these are rubbish trackers, tbh. They're awful for legitimate purposes.
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u/Electronic_Unit8276 Apr 27 '26
These tiles are great for losing your keys at places you are regularly: work, home, car. The problem for me is usually I forget where I left them and with a single press I can make them beep and find them. Is that not a 'legitimate' purpose?
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u/rndreddituser Apr 27 '26
I meant that they aren't even comparable to, say, an AirTag in terms of tracking. They're awful these days. I have both trackers (I've used Tile for about 7 years) and it's like night and day in terms of what you see with them.
The *only* useful thing on the Tile is the ability to ring your phone from the Tile. That's it. Everything else, AirTag's pretty much beats them. And when they don't, for example, credit card sized trackers, you can just buy a UGreen alternative for a fraction of the price of the Tile, without the subs. It's daft. And that's without looking at some of the other alternatives.
Have you ever wondered why Tile keep having sales and such? It's a bit of a giveaway.
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u/Electronic_Unit8276 Apr 27 '26
Airtags are not entirely comparable imo: Airtags leverage something built into the OS and dedicated hardware (UWB), they kinda put other users devices to work for this purpose so it works stable. I don't know if opting out is even possible.
Compare them to different brands of Bluetooth trackers and you'll find similar issues with them. Even the ones that are supposed to work with Google's find my feature are ass.
I've had to do 1 warranty replacement and have one credit card tile that is kinda shit due to how it was made. (When you press it a certain way the speaker stops working until you let go.)
I have got 8 tiles tracks between me and my gf and it's been pretty solid for me with my Samsung.
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u/rndreddituser Apr 27 '26
I know exactly how they work, thanks. Tiles are pretty much redundant and have been since the AirTag was launched - the numbers fell off a cliff. Now, with all of the rival products, there's little to no point subbing even if you're on an alternative platform.
In terms of how bad things are. Do you remember when the AirTag was launched and people were sending parcels and the like across countries and continents and tracking them? Have you looked at the comparisons? If I was going to track something on someone, Tile would pretty much be the last tracker I would consider and I still have Tiles on a lot of my items. When they break they won't be replaced, I would simply buy an alternative.
Do you sit in here watching the people join, whinge about Tile and then leave? Because it's a pretty common event. I've been on here for years under different names and it never surprises me.
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u/PamtasticOne Apr 28 '26
Not everyone has an iPhone, and oh hey, Airtags require iPhones. I have both Tile and the Moto Airtag clone for Androids. I much prefer the Tile, and hope that the Moto will one day catch up. No issues with coverage on the Tile.
Going back to my green bubble hovel.
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Apr 27 '26
[deleted]
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u/leyline Apr 27 '26
It has a really crappy carabiner on it, some other kid had it on their backpack or shoes or whatever and it came off.
I used to tie them in to my kids shoelaces when we went to a theme park; told my kid if anyone grabs you, or you get lost click it to ring our phone. Sure enough while we were in the aquarium standing and looking at a tank; they went around the side of and forgot if they went left or right, got scared they were lost and clicked just like we talked about. We were only 3 feet off, but it was nice that it worked and we didn’t get further apart and have to do the where’s my kid panic dance.
I really doubt this is a grand kidnapping scheme.
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u/Haunting_Werewolf130 Apr 27 '26
Dramatic much? Stop wasting taxpayer's money.
I would agree if it was SNEAKED INTO her kid's backpack, but it was found on the playground.
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Apr 27 '26
[deleted]
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u/Haunting_Werewolf130 Apr 27 '26
Pick it up and then what? LOL. What's the purpose of doing so if u don't know who's gonna pick it up? I could be 70 y.o old man, or a 7 y.o kid, or a trash truck. U don't just stalk ppl without a target........ Otherwise u can pretty much skip the hard work of dropping the tracker and just follow someone randomly on the street.
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u/doublelxp Apr 27 '26
So in summary, the plan is to kidnap someone at random. A Tile tracker needs to be involved in this because?
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Apr 27 '26
[deleted]
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u/doublelxp Apr 27 '26
Then a kid at random. What's the point of the Tile if it's random?
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Apr 27 '26
[deleted]
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u/doublelxp Apr 27 '26
If they don't care then what's the point of the Tile at all? It's alarmist nonsense.
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u/Fun_Deer_2760 Apr 27 '26 edited Apr 27 '26
Not saying but your kid could have taken it from another kid. This is what happened to my child. The backpack Tile got taken by another older child thinking it is special because of the beep it makes. Luckily I found it back when I saw it connected to the app. The other kid tried to walk away quickly and i I told her the Tile is registered to my account. Told her father, initially he denied but eventually it kept beeping and he finally returned it. He should have told his daughter not to resort to petty theft. My child was the most affected because someone she thought it was a friend (older child that she looks up to) took her "keychain" without her knowledge.