Local tech company lojacks the iPod

POSTED: 11:00 MDT Tuesday, July 31, 2007

by Eddie Kovsky

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Tags - Apple, Blackfin, Dateline, media

Set your ~~VCR~~ Tivo. Or just get home by 9 p.m. Wednesday, Aug. 1. Dateline NBC will feature Boise technology company Blackfin on national television.

Dateline’s Chris Hansen – perhaps most famous for the To Catch a Predator series – uses software developed by Blackfin to track down people who steal iPods.

Blackfin designed and developed the tracking software in a matter of weeks. According to a statement from Blackfin and NBC, the Dateline report demonstrates that Apple could easily have built theft protection into the iPod, but chose not to.

“It seems as though Apple could have done more to prevent iPod theft,” Blackfin software engineer Tony Rasa said. “Instead, their focus has been on deterring the theft of music.”

3 Comments

Interesting. This software has actually been around for a long time, it is called GadgetTrak and they have a patent-pending.
Comment By Ken Westin
Wednesday, August 1, 2007 @ 2:53 PM

I am familiar with Blackfin and GadgetTrak, and I can tell you that GadgetTrak is much more limited in scope than what Blackfin developed.
Also, if the software really has been around a long time I should think that will make it difficult to get a new patent issued, no?
Comment By Jefferson Jewell
Thursday, August 2, 2007 @ 8:58 AM

ummm...so, the tone of the message here is that Apple was negligent, or was taking part in some sort of conspiracy to foster Ipod theft?
Who cares? So they didn't include theft protection?
In a free trade society, Apple has every right (even the obligation) to assess the marketable properties of their product and focus on the ones that they perceive will be of the most value to any potential customers. They chose not to include theft protection software.
Did you need some cheese with that whine?
Comment By JDA
Tuesday, August 7, 2007 @ 7:35 AM

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