HOUSTON – Can you imagine, you get into your car and drive home and all the while someone is tracking you, able to follow you wherever you go, using a cheap, tiny device no bigger than a quarter?
It’s happening more and more as domestic violence abusers, ex-husbands, stalkers and others have, in some cases, begun using the Apple Air Tag and the Tile -- two devices designed to help you find your lost keys or wallet -- to instead track and follow their victims.
“The danger is how easily you can attach this device to someone’s car, to someone’s property and track them,” said Coleman Ryan, a cyber detective with K-Griff Investigations in Houston.
Now sadly, domestic abusers have figured out they can use these high tech finding devices, by hiding one somewhere on their victim’s car.
”I think with the rise of technology, has come the rise of technological abuse,” Michelle Sacks with the Houston Area Women’s Center said.
Sacks is with the center where they help abused women and men fleeing their abusers.
She says one of her clients, a mother with two children, fleeing her abuser, was tracked and eventually found by her ex using one of these devices.
“The kids had to go spend time with their father who was the mother’s abuser. What happened was the dad had put an Air Tag into the daughter’s shoe,” Sacks said.
Sacks said abusers have used other high tech locator tools to try and find their victims, including the Find My tool on Apple phones, Life 360 and the Snapchat app.
Her advice to anyone who is fleeing a domestic violence situation is to turn off all location services on all your phones and call the Houston Area Women’s Center for help.
”We have advocates available 24 hours a day, so you can call our hotline at 713-528-2121. If you don’t know how to turn off your location services on your phone, we can guide you through that as well,″ Sacks said. “Above all, remember you are never at fault and we are here to help you.”