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Tesla recovery latest example of apps helping owners locate stolen goods

Sherry Noik
Even as Tesla works out the kinks for its software-activated autopilot, the system appears to be doing well on its own. One Uber driver in Seattle narrowly avoided a crash when his Model S P85D braked on its own. Jon Hall was on duty on a rainy night and a car cut a sharp left in front of his electric taxi. Hall’s video description states that he was traveling at 45 mph and watching the stalled traffic in the right lane. He did not have time to hit the brakes, but luckily the car did it for him. Beginning in October 2014, Tesla began equipping Model S sedans with hardware to prepare for the introduction of its self-driving system. The Autopilot relies on a forward radar, a forward-facing camera, 12 long-range ultrasonic sensors, and a digitally controlled electronic assist braking system. All together, sensors can detect obstacles in a 16-foot radius around the car, allowing the braking system to act accordingly. <strong>Related: </strong>Tesla Model S saves woman and child from landslide Tesla’s Autopilot was released with its Version 7.0 software two weeks ago. The motors, brakes, and steering now work together to avoid collisions from the front and sides and keep the car on the road. For a price, you can download other autonomous goodies, For those who didn’t pay attention in driver’s ed, your Tesla can now parallel park on its own, in addition to alerting you of open parking spots. The car can also work to stay within its own lane and even change lanes at the tap of a turn signal. Adaptive cruise control adjusts to traffic, and headlights can automatically switch between high and low beams. “Tesla Autopilot relieves drivers of the most tedious and potentially dangerous aspects of road travel,” the automaker wrote in its blog. It likens the system to those used in airliners. The driver must remain alert, and can access the car’s processes through the instrument panel at any time. Recently ordered Model S sedans come equipped with the Autopilot software update, which includes automatic emergency braking and front and side collision avoidance. For $2,500, buyers can add convenience features, which includes the self-parking and other autonomous goodies. The system will also be featured in the new Model X crossover.

In what is thought to be a first in Canada, a Vancouver couple recovered their stolen Tesla Model S last week using the car’s own app to pinpoint its location.

More and more, technology is giving rise to machines that can track themselves down or find stolen goods.

There have already been several documented cases of the Find My iPhone app helping to locate stolen phones and computers. In February, a woman in Langley, B.C., got her iMac laptop back three weeks after it was taken during a break-in at her home. In one case in Victoria in 2013, the app located an iPhone and $4,000 worth of photography equipment that was swiped along with it.

Apps like Find My iPhone, Where’s My Droid and Sony’s my Xperia, use GPS to track the movement of the device item in real time.

So does the Tesla, with an app the owner loads onto their smartphone.

That’s how Katya and Cary Pinkowski were able to watch their car whizzing through the streets of Richmond, just south of Vancouver, last Thursday.

There are thought to be only around 1,100 of the super high-tech electric cars in Canada, and Cpl. Dennis Hwang, of the Richmond RCMP, says it’s the first time his detachment has encountered a Tesla recovery like this one.

“This case is unique because the tracking is so accurate. And normally the user does not have that real-time telemetry available to them,” Hwang told Yahoo Canada News.

The information helped police narrow down the best spot to attempt to stop the car while minimizing injury or damage, and an unmarked canine unit vehicle was able to come up on the Tesla “with a bit of element of surprise,” Hwang said.

Howard Geddes Skelding, 24, is charged with possession of stolen property over $5,000. He was taken into custody and released pending a court date.

A Tesla owner in San Diego helped the cops find her car in the same way last year.

Another device, called Tile, allows users to attach a small Bluetooth tracker chip to any item — luggage, keys, wallets, etc. — and use the app to make it “ring” or ascertain its last location on a map. If the item goes out of range, every user who’s running the app on their phone, worldwide, becomes an anonymous tracker to help find it.

The company says its tool successfully tracked down a stolen car in Holland, 180 kilometres away from where its owner last saw it, in Belgium.

Hwang says he has heard about such self-tracking Bluetooth devices aimed at keeping tabs on children or pets but says he hasn’t encountered any that figured heavily in an investigation.

But even with such mechanisms available to them, the public should not take the vigilante route, authorities warn.

Earlier this year, an 18-year-old Ontario man was murdered when he tried to retrieve the phone he’d left in a taxi earlier in the evening.

Find my iPhone led Jeremy Cook, of Brampton, to an address in London where he confronted three men in a car. He was shot dead, and his body dumped behind a strip mall. One suspect is dead and another is still being sought by police.

“Our advice is to leave any sort of more serious matters to the police,” Hwang says. “That’s what we’re trained for. It’s our job and our duty.”