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A comment on How does Apple privately find offline devices?. Parent comment

Re:How does Apple privately find offline devices? by berbec on Wednesday June 05, 2019 @06:15PM (#20109693)
NFC is passive until powered by an external signal. It's very short range, but it does not require internal power. There could be a longer range version at some point.
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Re:How does Apple privately find offline devices? by Xylakant on Wednesday June 05, 2019 @06:20PM (#20109729)
Yes, but an NFC tag cannot initiate a connection on its own volition. And that’s very much a feature I like in WiFi: I can actively start downloading something. A WiFi card that only responds to an external ping is useless.
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Re:How does Apple privately find offline devices? by m463 on Wednesday June 05, 2019 @07:24PM (#20110103)
I think what berbec is saying is maybe you can locate an NFC device that has a depleted battery.

That said, I don't know if apple NFC works that way. Apple can use NFC to read nearby NFC tags, and possibly become an NFC tag, but I don't know if it can respond in a static way without power.

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Re:How does Apple privately find offline devices? by RosanaAnaDana on Wednesday June 05, 2019 @06:20PM (#20109726)
Maybe thats what this is. I'm well outside of the world of signal transduction, but a cell antenna/ wifi/ bluetooth antenna might be able to..
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