Oliver Haslam on May 27, 2022, 7:56 pm

F1 Driver Sebastian Vettel Chases AirPods Thief Through Barcelona Using Apple’s Find My

Apple’s AirPods support the Find My feature that makes them easier to find when you leave them under a cushion on the couch. But did you know that the same feature can help when your AirPods are in a bag that was stolen outside your hotel in Barcelona?

It can when the AirPods belong to F1 driver Sebastian Vettel.

According to a BBC report, Vettel had his bag stolen and was able to chase its new owners down thanks to the AirPods that were inside. He later found those AirPods, but not the bag, after the thief apparently ditched them for fear of them being traced.

An Aston Martin spokesperson said: “A bag belonging to Sebastian Vettel was stolen in Barcelona this morning. He tried to find it by using his iPhone to track his earphones which were in his bag, but when he located his earphones he found them abandoned and was therefore unable to locate his stolen bag.”

While Apple’s AirPods don’t feature the same location-finding technology as an AirTag, they can be located within a reasonable range. That’s what happened here, although we do find ourselves wishing that bag also had an AirTag inside for the ultimate in location-tracking justice.

Barcelona has unfortunately found itself to be well known for thefts of this nature, with the annual Mobile World Congress event often one that sees international travellers fall foul to local pickpockets and thieves.