@dcalfine:

Yeah I was gonna say....

Elijah

I'm shitty at math at a quarter to three in the morning. I meant 99.9% cheaper. fudge.

dcalfine

you're probably better off luring a thief with "I am rich" than "private"

that said, private is $998 (0.1%) cheaper

dcalfine

As someone who had an iPhone stolen, I think I might get this.

I mean, whoever steals an iPhone IS pretty damn stupid.

And if I ever find him/her/them, they will also be crippled.

Elijah

then we proceed to show up to get ass kicked by thieves

reactionsok

I'm working on an even simpler app that will flash "THIS IS NOT AN iPHONE!!!!" in big red letters.

I'm figuring that will keep the bad people at bay by making them go and steal a real iPhone.

Imagine all the chagrined laughs that will ensue when they realize they were duped!

dc-united

This is actually cool. Win.

crazy0000

Actually... this might work.

You'd have to hope that when he/she opens it that they're at their house and not some random spot. Unless, they could get this to run in the background or ping back every so often so that you could check where your iPhone is at certain times.

ttech10

I'm not sure how big the population of bumbling bandits is [...]

someToast

99% of iPhone thieves are going to just wipe the data and pawn it off on eBay rather than go through the trouble of trying to steal your emails about next week's meetings or your Aunt Sally's phone number.

ScotteusMaximus

I bet Apple is going to pull it soon since it e-mails personal data without the user's knowledge (Even if it is the wrong user).

Super Sonic

HEY! WHAT DOES THIS BIG RED OBVIOUS BUTTON DO!?

Drummer_Boy

will it work without the sim card in, because if I was a thief I would ditch THAT sucker the moment it was jacked

Kevin

I had my cell phone stolen once at school. So I sent a text message saying:

"This phone is equipped with GPS. If you dont return this phone to the campus church within a half hour I will report stolen to police with your current location."

Luckily it worked. My phone was near the front door of the church.

MadColombian

Personally, I'd have the icon display "PORN"

Because who can resist free porn? I guarantee that if an iPhone with that on it gets stolen, Porn is the first thing they're going to push.

Lyrai

If you're gunna steal an iPhone, I assume you're stealing it for the phone itself not its content. So while it may be fun to snoop around and see what kinda stuff is on it, a smart iPhone theif would sync it right away and to a fresh install of the iPhone software, @Kevin: 'ditch the sim', and sell it on craigslist a few states over

Dooosh

Don't underestimate how many stupid criminals there are. There are a lot. In fact, most are pretty dumb. This would probably work pretty well.

dallasmay2

and when you launch it, the phone will ask for them to allow the app to access "your current location"... so that means your thief needs to be doubly not-so-bright... uhhh...
(crap, why can't >I< think of apps like this to sell... maybe I'm no smarter than a common iphone thief...)

MyquiH

@dcalfine: @Elijah: Actually the math isn't TOO far off if it doesn't work. Let's hope that this stupid crimminal doesn't read the Giz.

@MadColombian: And your roomie never 'fessed up, eh? :-)

Mandatory_Field

I think the slim chance that this app would have worked was completely destroyed with the posting of this article.

RayZR

uh..the people that steal phones (any phones), not just iPhones aren't exactly the brightest people on the planet. They'd click on this in a second. Wouldn't you if you legitimately found one laying on the street?

Papercutninja

"... This iPhone will self-destruct in 5 seconds"

4

3

2

1

(A sure hit at the airport security screening station)

Krrong

Well the new firmware does have a new Nice feature where if someone enters your passcode 10x wrong it does a secure wipe which takes about 1 1/2 hour to complete and destroys everything and the only way to stop it is to smash it with a hammer since you can't just remove the battery on the freggin thing and the power and home buttons are disable, and it case you do get it back all you have to do is connect to itunes and it restores everything from the default backup

snitch29

Would be more relevant for us Gen 1 users if it scrambled all the data on the thing when clicked. like a panic button of sorts.

aeroworks

" I'm not sure how big the population of bumbling bandits is..." It's huge.

A friend of mine is an assistant district attorney. To paraphrase him, "If you think that we catch most criminals through good old-fashioned detective work, you would be wrong. The crooks are just tripping on their own dicks."

DeadWriter

i dont think this is a bad idea - for a dollar you get sort of a lottery chance of recovering the iphone... sort of... assuming you are able to get email and navigate to the area where the guy is... and he's still there... and you can somehow convince him to give it back...

ive had cheap shitty phones stolen before. i sent a text offering to pay $20 for it back (i just didn't want to have to track down everyones numbers again) but no luck.

the thing that pisses me off about theives is they'll rip a $400 stereo out of your car, and then sell it for $40 or some other bullshit amount.

nutbastard

@nutbastard: Try having the GPS stolen out of your Cadillac. $5000 for the unit (because of a core charge), and $5000 to get the whole car re-wired (GM had to make a new harness from scratch) because he cut it instead of unplugging it. Not to mention I saw it sold on ebay two weeks later for $250. Comprehensive insurance is GOOD.

donjumpsuit

what if you're a tool and press the 'private button' on your own iPhone?

Ornament

god, I could have used this back when my first iphone was jacked from right in front of me!!!GRRRR!! Still, I think it's a good idea

beofusion

best way to prevent someone from stealing your iphone is

not to get one.

001

What would be nice is if we could customize the icons/names of applications ourselves so that we could masquerade any application with this feature. Then it might actually work.

HamlinElephonkey