Where is my suitcase: Lufthansa & Co. accept AirTag tracking links
More airlines would like help finding luggage: Passengers can share the location of their suitcase via Apple's "Where is?" network.
If you have an AirTag in your suitcase, you can now share the location data with the Lufthansa Group airlines if you lose it.
(Image: Lufthansa Group)
Lufthansa and its subsidiaries now accept AirTags as a tracking aid for missing baggage: if an AirTag or another tracker compatible with Apple's "Where is?" network is in the missing suitcase, passengers can now share its location with customer service at – and "digitally support baggage tracking", as the Lufthansa Group announced.
In addition to Lufthansa, the subsidiaries Swiss, Austrian Airlines, Brussels Airlines and Eurowings are also on board. With immediate effect, Virgin Atlantic will also support this, as the airline announced on Thursday. For flights with Delta, United, Air Canada and Air New Zealand, this type of suitcase tracking has been available since the end of 2024.
AirTag tracking links yes – but please not immediately
Lufthansa recommends that customers set the tracker to lost mode if they lose their suitcase and enter their email address there, for example. The tracking link can be created in the "Where is?" app under "Objects" in the "Lost AirTag" section with the entry "Share object location". Lufthansa apparently does not want this immediately: Only if the suitcase has not been found after two days will the customer be given the option to share the tracking link "to support the allocation", according to customer service.
The airlines use a new function introduced by Apple last November, which enables more flexible sharing of the AirTag location. Users can temporarily share the location of lost objects with third parties via a simple web link – for up to 7 days. Sharing then ends automatically. If an AirTag has already seen the owner's iPhone beforehand, third-party tracking is also switched off.
The prerequisite for this is that at least iOS 18.2 is running on the iPhone. You don't necessarily have to put an AirTag in the case for this; a usually much cheaper alternative from third-party manufacturers also works – as long as the tracker is compatible with Apple's "Where is?" network. Almost every Apple device recognizes such Bluetooth trackers in its own environment and forwards the location – with end-to-end encryption protected – to Apple servers. This allows the owner to view the location, sometimes to within a few meters.
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Much excitement about alleged AirTag ban at Lufthansa
A good two years ago, Lufthansa's cautious and sometimes contradictory statements about an alleged ban on AirTags in luggage caused considerable annoyance among customers who had long wanted to keep an eye on their suitcases in this way. The German Federal Aviation Authority finally clarified that such small trackers, which are usually powered by a button cell, do not pose a security risk.
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