TikTok user explains "hack" that lets you track your iPhone even if it is off or on Airplane Mode

The other day we told you about a guy living in the Big Apple who had placed an Apple AirTag on his scooter which was stolen. Despite having the AirTag on the bike and using the "FindMy" app, a ride-around with New York City's Finest proved to be fruitless. So the guy rented a scooter, went off on his own, and this time the AirTag came through.

The victim found his stolen Honda Metropolitan, but the problem occurred when he asked for it back and threatened to call the cops. The poor guy was left with a fractured nose that will require multiple surgeries and he did not get his property returned. This is not the way to retrieve stolen property from the person you think took it from you. The correct process includes making sure that you have the police by your side when you demand the return of your property from the miscreant who stole it.

A Master Class on getting your stolen iPhone back was recently posted online by TikToker Katrina Audrey (via DailyDot). She recently had the upsetting experience of having her iPhone stolen. Amazingly, she got it back without getting the crap knocked out of her by the thief thanks to a "hack" she picked up on Instagram. It requires the victim to use their Apple ID to sign into any other iOS device (you might need to find a willing friend or relative with an iPhone).

Once you sign in to the secondary device, you can use it to control the settings of the stolen Apple iPhone. To make this work, Audrey explains how you need to set up your iPhone (before it gets stolen, obviously). She says, "First step go to Face ID and Passcode, you want to toggle off Control Center and USB Accessories. Toggle on Location Services, Find my iPhone and make sure to toggle on all three of these (Find my iPhone, Find my Network, and Send Last Location).

It is very important to have your iPhone set up correctly because, as Audrey notes, "This allows your phone, even when it’s off or on airplane mode, to still be findable. Whoever stole my phone last night literally was out all night." On her TikTok video, she shares a screenshot of a map of Chicago that shows the path taken by the thief with her iPhone in his possession.

Giving a play-by-play of the journey her purloined phone went on, Katrina said, "Look at what they went through in the city of Chicago. South Side, North Side, they ended up going back to Gurney, Illinois." Showing her TikTok audience the house where her iPhone was allegedly being held, she stated, "This is the address that they had it at, nice little place isn’t it?"

Now the next step Audrey took was the smartest move she made. Instead of knocking on the door and demanding her iPhone back, a ploy that might have ended with her untimely death, the TikToker called the Gurney Police Department and gave the cops the address where she suspected her stolen iPhone was being kept. The police went to the address and retrieved Katrina's iPhone proving that rescuing your stolen handset doesn't require a risky "Raid on Entebbe" blitzkrieg.

An older report from 2013 from the FCC revealed that 68% of those who have had their phone stolen are unable to get them back. Sadly, in 44% of the cases, the smartphone was stolen when it was left behind in a public setting and scooped up. The FCC found at the time that the average phone theft occurred in a restaurant in the afternoon, and it took an hour for the victim to realize that his handset was missing.

The most important part of Katrina Audrey's story is that the police helped out and were able to get her phone back. More often victims get the cold shoulder from the cops even if they know exactly which house their stolen phone is at. As one victim of a phone theft said, "That’s wild because when I called the police here in San Francisco and told them I knew the exact house it was in, they said take it as a loss."