Yeah, it feels to me that Apple went too far with their anti-stalker provisions. I believe much of the problem could be eliminated if there was some sort of central filter to the alerts. Phone says to the filter "I see an unknown air tag ID# xxxxx". So long as there is another phone that says "I see a known air tag ID# xxxxx" no alert is triggered. Only when no device claims the tag as known would the phone speak up.

So long as somebody nearby knows the tag it's almost certainly either someone with you or someone simply moving in the same direction and nearby. If it has been planted you'll find out when the planter moves away from you.

Wouldn't this mean that all a stalker would have to do is hide an iPhone in your car along with the airtag?

Although at that point you don't even need the airtag.

I keep getting these notifications for my own AirTags.

I know they’re mine because the notification shows the last four digits of my own phone number.

When an AirTag is assigned to an iCloud account, and a device (say an iPhone) is with you, then you shouldn't get these messages. But if one of you didn't bring their phone but, for example, the keys, you will get these messages, yeah.

Thanks for this. My wife often doesn’t bring her phone on walks, but does bring her keys. That would make sense!

You can track each other with your phone and Google tracking or a bunch of other apps. Maybe that is simpler alternative to tags?

I am given the choice what I want to do, and chose the "always ignore this AirTag" option.

This opens up a new "evil maid" attack: secretly tracking anyone whose phone you have access to.

You are worried about someone who physically has access to your phone and knows your passcode tracking you? That is not the problem being discussed here.

I know it's not being discussed, I am introducing it as an adjucent attack vector that is already an issue with Google Maps' location sharing. Google counters it by sending periodic emails to remind you that you're sharing your location, and with whom.

Being snooped on by someone with physical access to your device, as well as the opportunity to use it while unlocked (passcode or not) happens more times than one might think! It could be anything from a creepy colleague, or an insecure romantic partner.

Are your Apple accounts in a Family Sharing group? I have no idea if that would affect this feature, but my wife and I also have AirTags on our keys and we travel together plenty and have never received this notification.

Thanks for this suggestion. We are not in a Family Sharing group, so I’ll look into whether this helps. I also might just move her AirTag to my account to track her keys, since if she’s misplaced her keys there’s a good chance she’s misplaced her phone as well.

Same. I just wish you could transfer ownership of a tag between family members.

You can. Disconnect it from one person's iCloud, connect it to the other. We did it with our cat's AirTag when I got a newer iPhone, so we could use the more accurate location.

I do wish there was a share feature, though.

The lack of integration with family sharing has made AirTags mostly useless for me.

It’s a genuinely baffling omission.

Especially given the existence of Find My, which makes it easy to set up phone tracking so we can "stalk" each other. Apparently it's okay to track wife's phone but it's not okay to track my wife's backpack.