"Because iTunes has an e-mail address and credit card information," Hekman says, "Apple could use that information to track people down who use stolen iPods - or even charge them."įurthermore, asserts Hekman, "Apple could go so far as to mess up an iPod internally, making it useless." But he admits that "a savvy computer person could bypass even that you can reload a hard drive to make it work again."Īpple could track stolen iPods, but it doesn't want to, says Nate Glucksman, an Apple employee at San Diego State University's bookstore. Ted Hekman, an IT developer for a Los Angeles-based online ad revenue company, suggests another step Apple could take. But to know that the iPod has been stolen, the service rep would have to run the serial number, and that isn't routinely done. "It's aiding and abetting in a crime." He points out that cell phone companies are responsive to customers whose phones are stolen, deactivating the phones so they can't be used.Īpple maintains that it won't service an iPod that it knows has been stolen. He knew that Apple tracked iPods because, he says, "iTunes recommends songs through the serial numbers of the last iPod connected" to a computer.ĭoing business with customers possessing stolen iPods is illegal, Ferry thinks. "I guess I assumed Apple would help," he said.įerry had hoped that Apple would refuse iTunes service to his stolen iPod.
Ferry had also called Apple and been disappointed. He'd been traveling from Detroit to Boston when an iPod he'd borrowed was stolen from his laptop-computer bag. So why isn't Apple doing anything to prevent the sale of songs to the person with YOUR stolen iPod?"Ī recent graduate of Suffolk University Law School in Boston, Ferry started the site in May after losing an iPod. Apple sells songs to people that enter their billing information into the iTunes software. "Apple's iTunes software records the serial number of the last connected iPod. "Apple maintains records of stolen iPod serial numbers," the website reads. On it, Ferry suggests that there is something Apple could do. I decided to research stolen iPods online.
An Apple service representative named David took my serial number and opened a case, but then he told me, "There's nothing really that this will do." After filing a police incident report, I called 800-MY-APPLE to report the theft. One Monday morning last month, I found that my car, parked on Third Avenue in Hillcrest, had been broken into and my $400 video iPod was gone. "Because iTunes has an e-mail address and credit card information, Apple could use that information to track people down who use stolen iPods."
0 kommentar(er)
