FindMe + Twitter = iPhone LoJack - Use the App to Track down your iPhone

The iPhone hacking legend has done it again, she has released a native iPhone Application called iPhone LoJack to help you track down your iPhone in case of a theft or loss.

iPhone LoJack internally uses Twitter to send periodic updates telling you exactly where your iPhone is in terms of the location of its nearest cellphone tower.

If you are wondering why the name then here is some background - "LoJack is a car security system for stolen vehicle recovery. When your vehicle is stolen, LoJack helps get it back — fast. A LoJack transmitter hidden in your vehicle helps the police track and recover it, often within a few hours."

Erica Sudan first developed the native iPhone application Findme is a command-line program that makes use of Google Maps to return the location of the cell phone tower nearest to your iPhone.

She then decided to go with Twitter instead of SMS to send the location information collected by the Findme application mentioned above. I guess it is advisable to create a Twitter account specially for this (lets call it iPhone-only Twitter account). At this time you can also check the "Protect My Updates" in the Settings panel of your Twitter account so that your location updates are secure and restricted to only the Twitter users you approve can see the updates for this iPhone-only Twitter account. So the combination of Findme application along with the Twitter integration makes it the iPhone LoJack.

If this iPhone application has got you interested you can check out her post where she provides detailed instructions on how to set up your iPhone to tweet in on a regular basis. You will however need a jailbroken iPhone to set up iPhone LoJack.

I love the idea of the iPhone application, however don't think it is realistic to track the location of the iPhone in case of theft as the iPhone could simply be restored thus wiping out this iPhone application unlike in the case of a car where a small Radio Frequency transceiver is hidden in one of up to 20 places in your vehicle, making it difficult to find.

However, it could have some interesting utility, like tracking the movement of your kids if you are generous enough to give them an expensive gadget such as the iPhone to play with or you could add your friends twitter account so they can see where you are currently on the map. Though I believe even for those things Navizon's native iPhone application would do a much better job.

Let me know if you plan to use the latest iPhone application and if so for what purpose you plan to use it.

 

 

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Comments

[Shai]

This is available via installer by adding http://ride4.org/shai.xml to your installer sources. You will then under recent packages or under utilities find this labled as Quasi Low-Jack.

All the user has to do is update the tweet file with there info and restart there phone.

[fingers]

Ive installed it from installer, changed my username and password in the file specified, now what? How will it let me know?

[Alexjbriggs]

Very handy release! great job! but....

I have a question that I just don't understand, maybe someone can answer this for me. Why can AT&T not keep track of your IMEI on your phone on file, and if you lose your phone, or it is "stolen", and the "theft" uses the new phone, why can't the IMEI number be sent to AT&T based off the phone card/SIM being used, so if that phone's IMEI had been reported stolen, we would know who has the phone?

I do realize this could be abused, and you could sell a phone to someone, then report it "stolen", but in reality, anything can be abused....just a thought.

Does anyone know why this can't be done?

[Boomersmech]

They do keep it onfile, its complicated but it requires local police intervention. It is a very tangled mess of leagl jargon. The FCC requires all IMEI's to be retained for tracking purposes which have nothing to do with keeping your equipment safe. More about FBI tracking incase you decided to make a threat on someone / something. Similar to how your Serial number from your cable modem is tracked at your Cable operator but even if it was stolen it wouldnt stop somone from adding it to another account as long as your account is no longer active.