Bluetooth tracker hidden in postcard and mailed to warship exposed its location

Posted by thunderbong 2 days ago

Comments

Comment by bombcar 2 days ago

If this thing is like an Apple AirTag or Milwaukee One-Key - there's another leak somewhere on that ship! Bluetooth isn't strong enough to reach anywhere from sea, and they don't have GPS or satellite communications built in.

Which means they're allowing iPhones and/or Android devices that are doing the communications for the bluetooth dongle - and have access to GPS.

Seems a much bigger issue than adding some additional mail sorting equipment.

Comment by sollewitt 2 days ago

From TFA: it was in port at the time.

Comment by bombcar 2 days ago

Can't ships in port be identified by ... looking at them?

It happened for a day and seems to include underway.

Comment by throw1234567891 1 day ago

> Can't ships in port be identified by ... looking at them?

Yeah, when you know where they are. You see the point? Pun fully intended.

Comment by aaron695 1 day ago

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Comment by gnabgib 2 days ago

Original source: https://www.theregister.com/2026/04/17/dutch_navy_frigate_tr...

Comment by jrflowers 2 days ago

I wonder what model they used. I don’t think I’ve seen one of those trackers that could be hidden in a postcard

Comment by ahazred8ta 2 days ago

There are ultra thin credit card size BT / GPS trackers designed for wallets. https://duckduckgo.com/?q=credit+card+size+gps+tracker&ia=we...

Comment by jrflowers 2 days ago

Cool!

Comment by fennecbutt 2 days ago

Look at nordic chips. They were super smol even when I was using em almost a decade ago. Wsclp are crazy smol.

Comment by kotaKat 1 day ago

"Postcard" might be a bit of a misnomer too, because it's mentioned that overall "envelopes" weren't being screened, just packages.

Just slip an AirTag in the greeting card and it made it onto the ship, someone opened it, went "WTF" and tossed the AirTag immediately.

Guess they'll x-ray all their inbound envelopes now, too. I'm also given memories of Entertainment Weekly when they shipped a fully functional Android phone (with T-Mobile data!) stripped down between the pages of a magazine ad for the CW Network... all just to display a feed of Tweets. https://mashable.com/archive/ew-has-smartphone-inside#92887I...

Or that time Microsoft included a free hotspot in some magazines.

https://www.pcmag.com/news/microsoft-embeds-wi-fi-routers-in...

Comment by egberts1 1 day ago

Time to irradiate all mails