When his Honda HRV was stolen from right under the nose of a shopping mall valet parking service, a Kuala Lumpur man and his friends tracked down the thief with an AirTag.
Malaysian technology site SoyaCinau reports that Zach Khai Shin had his car stolen at 2:15 PM local time on Sunday, July 7. He found his car a bit less than 20 miles away from where he left it and got the police to arrest the thief. The vehicle was stolen from the Suria shopping mall’s valet parking in Kuala Lumpur city center (KLCC).
As you can imagine, this did not earn a good review from the car’s owner, who wrote on Facebook after the theft (in translation), “KLCC valet service is best not to use!”
“[The valet staff] told me he locked the car and turned off the engine,” he continued. “And then? How can the car not be seen, please?”
In the same Facebook post, he showed both his valet parking ticket — and his car keys.
However, since Zach Khai Shin had an AirTag in his cat, he was able to see that it was being driven toward the Subang area, around 17 miles away. While he filed a police report, his friends began tracking the car’s AirTag, locating it at a private residence and calling the police.
Although the shopping mall staff issued a notice saying that it had “immediately launched a comprehensive investigation…” and that it was through their CCTV footage that the thief was arrested, the driver says the mall staff played little part in the recovery of the vehicle.
“I want to thank Apple AirTag,” he said in an update post. “Fortunately, the car has Apple AirTag to find the car in such a short time. Otherwise, the whole thing would be basically fruitless if [he had to rely] only the police and KLCC.”
It should be noted that Zach Khai Shin did then thank the local police for “moving faster than I expected.”
(Via AppleInsider)
