United Adds Apple’s Lost Luggage Recovery Tool For Travelers

Recently, Apple unveiled an exciting new feature known as “Share Item Location,” designed to enable users to securely share the location of their lost Find My-compatible devices or luggage equipped with AirTags with their airline. This initiative aims to facilitate the recovery of misplaced items. The feature is now operational, with United Airlines being the first to implement it. According to a press release from United, the functionality to relay lost item details from the Find My network has been integrated into their mobile app. This rollout coincided with the launch of iOS 18.2, which also includes significant advancements in Apple Intelligence. Air Canada has also announced they will be employing this feature.

The objective of this collaboration is to allow users to “effortlessly share the accessory’s location with the airline’s customer service team” to expedite the recovery process of mishandled items. David Kinzelman, United’s chief customer officer, stated that this new capability will assist customers in locating their lost baggage “much more efficiently.”

Here’s how the recovery procedure works: If your baggage does not arrive at your destination, simply open the United mobile app and file a delayed baggage report. At this point, you can securely share the location data sourced from the Find My network.

To generate a tracking link, users can access the Find My app on their iPhone, iPad, or Mac. This link will direct them to an interactive map on a webpage that displays the real-time location of the missing item and updates as it changes, complete with a timestamp for tracking.

Once the item is located and returned to the customer, the shared location information stops updating, and the link expires after one week. For enhanced security, the entire process is end-to-end encrypted, ensuring that the shared location data remains confidential between the customer and the airline.

In the upcoming months, major airlines such as Lufthansa, Qantas, Singapore Airlines, Swiss International Air Lines, Turkish Airlines, and Virgin Atlantic are slated to join the two dozen other airlines that will support Apple’s Share Item Location feature.

To enhance its implementation, Apple has partnered with global aviation technology leader SITA (Société Internationale de Télécommunications Aéronautique) to incorporate this feature into their WorldTracer baggage tracking system. This collaboration aims to provide this new convenience to approximately 2,800 airports worldwide, serving over 500 commercial airlines.