MobileMe Helps Track Down iPhone Thief

This is the second story in the last few days about technology aiding in the recovery of, well, still more technology. Last time it was a wireless controller helping to track down an Xbox 360. This time it's Apple's beleagured MobileMe service helping to nab an iPhone thief.

MobileMe was the subject of many complaints when it was first launched; Steve Jobs even went so far as to take the blame for the buggy rollout of Apple's nascent cloud computing service.

In this case, MobileMe worked just fine, thank you.

You can read the story yourself on eBay. The user, J. Rob Greene, had apparently had his iPhone stolen. Well, he was so addicted (or crazed) over his old iPhone that he went out and bought a new one that same night.

The next day, as I'm scrolling through to make a phone call, I notice some new contacts in my brand new phone. Apparently, the thief had added contacts to my stolen phone, and Apple's MobileMe service synced those contacts with the internet, and then with my NEW iPhone! I called the contacts, got the thief's information, and called the police. By the end of the night, I was the proud owner of TWO iPhones.

Hilarious. The thief was entering contacts information that was syncing to the cloud and then to Greene's new iPhone. Of course, if his contacts had been more loyal, the thief still might have gotten away with it. But they weren't (or perhaps Greene was slightly tricky).

At any rate, the iPhone, which is a 16 GB black model in, as Greene says, perfect shape. However, his starting bid is $399 and he has 0 bids as a result. I'm also unclear how much he had to pay for his new phone; since he obviously hadn't run through his two-year contract yet he would have had to pay the full price, $599 for a 16 GB model.

He also states in his auction that he received a $150 speeding ticket on his way to the Apple store. We're not sure if that's simply hyperbole, or if he is as seriously crazy about the iPhone as he sounds.