What can I find out about you if I know where you are at all times? Weekend at Gjorgji's confronts the misuse of so-called item trackers as a powerful out-of-the-box tool for stalkers. It was presented at the Undercover exhibition, aimed at uncovering hidden narratives that are embedded into our everyday experiences surrounding technology.
Conveniently priced at 6.95€, these coin-sized trackers were popularised by the Apple AirTag and have become widely available. Its small size and lack safety features make it dangerously easy for stalkers to plant them on a victim and track them without them knowing. As technology makers and consumers, we are often confronted with a choice between privacy and convenience. Once again, we chose convenience.
Using an item tracker to monitor his location, I retrace the steps of my friend Gjorgji for a weekend, who kindly consented to this experiment, learning about his habits and the places where he is the most vulnerable at.
Thanks to a simple piece of custom software, I was able to log his location at regular intervals, building a map of his locations over time. Weekend at Gjorgji's exposes the many documented cases of stalking enabled by item trackers and documents my experiments in circumventing their weak safety mechanisms.