Our Story
I built Trace Vault
because I had to.
I'm Max, the founder of Trace Vault. This is the story of why I built it, and the night it proved itself in a way I never expected.
The Problem
I travel a lot. For years, I used Apple AirTags to keep track of my bags and luggage while moving through countries like New Zealand and across Asia. The idea was simple: if something went missing, I'd know where it was.
But in practice, AirTags never really fit my life. They're too obvious to stay hidden, and easy for someone to find and throw away if they ever took something of mine. The battery was its own problem too, it always seemed to die at the worst possible moment, usually somewhere I couldn't easily buy a replacement.
I looked for alternatives. Most came with their own compromises: a monthly subscription, still-disposable batteries, or a tracker that needed to be thrown away entirely once its battery died. None of them actually solved the problem. They just moved it somewhere else.
Then, in Vietnam in early 2020, just before COVID changed everything, one of my bags got stolen.
The bag I lost later that same day. I never saw it again, only the AirTag that had been inside it.
There was an AirTag inside. For a moment, I felt relieved, this was exactly why I'd put it there.
But the person who took my bag found it almost immediately, pulled it out, and threw it away. Instead of leading me to my bag, the AirTag just showed me where they'd tossed it. The bag itself was gone for good.
A tracker is only as good as its ability to stay with the thing it's protecting.
Building the Solution
So I decided
to build it myself.
That trip ended early. COVID was spreading fast, and the world was shutting down around me. I came home to the same thing everyone else did: nowhere to go, and suddenly a lot of free time. I spent much of it at home, thinking about what had happened and what I actually wanted instead: something rechargeable instead of dependent on replaceable batteries, discreet enough that it wouldn't immediately look like a tracking device, free to use without another monthly subscription, and simple enough that I wouldn't need to install yet another app just to use it.
COVID ended up lasting almost three years. For most of that time, the idea stayed just that, something I'd think about and sketch out now and then, rather than anything I was seriously building.
What actually pushed me to get serious was my father. He travels a lot too, and he'd always had a habit of losing his wallet, but around this time it started happening constantly. I couldn't find anything already out there that solved it properly, and with all the time I suddenly had, I finally had no excuse not to try building it myself. By late 2022, I was actually designing and prototyping.
That got me thinking differently about the whole problem. What if the tracker itself looked and felt like a normal card? Something thin enough to sit inside a wallet alongside bank cards and ID, without creating a bulge or obviously looking like a tracking device. Something that could play a sound on request too, so it was easy to actually find once you were close. And it had to be simple enough that my parents, without any technical know-how, could use it entirely on their own.
If he misplaced his wallet, he could find it again. And if it was ever stolen, someone looking inside would be far less likely to spot and remove a card-shaped tracker than a familiar round AirTag.
My mother wanted one for her purse too, mostly for the peace of mind. Then friends started asking about it. The problem clearly wasn't just mine.
What followed was more than a year of prototypes, failed attempts, and small improvements. By early 2024, I was finally ready to sell my first cards. The result was the Trace Vault Tracking Card: slim enough for a wallet, rechargeable, built on Apple's own Find My network, and free to use for as long as you own it.
What started as a fix for my own problem has since grown into something bigger.
100,000+
Cards Sold
17
Countries
Put to the Test
Then it happened
to me again.
Saturday, December 20, 2025.
A concert in the Netherlands.
I was there with a friend. It was crowded, the kind of place where wallets and phones go missing from pockets without anyone noticing. So we did what seemed sensible: we rented a locker and put our coats and wallets inside, assuming they'd be safer locked away than in our pockets.
When we came back, the locker had been broken open. Our wallets were gone. Other things we'd left inside weren't touched, it looked like someone had seen us put the wallets in and targeted them specifically.
My friend's wallet didn't have a tracker inside. Mine had my own Trace Vault card.
I opened Find My. My wallet was still somewhere around the concert, which was some relief, but not much help on its own. There were about 4,000 people there. Knowing it was somewhere in that crowd wasn't enough to actually go find it.
We had to catch our last train home, or we wouldn't have any way back that night. So we left, froze our bank cards on the way, and I kept watching the location the whole ride home.
Then it started moving. Not toward us, away from the concert, out of the city.
By the next morning, my wallet wasn't in the Netherlands anymore. It was in Germany, 232 kilometers away, just over two hours from home, pinned to a specific address.
The actual Find My screenshot from that morning.
We'd already reported the theft to the police that morning. Now we had something far more useful to give them than just a description: a location.
We considered driving there ourselves. The police strongly advised against it, they had no idea who was inside or what we'd be walking into, so we listened and waited instead.
For roughly four days, the tracker stayed put at that same address. As long as it wasn't moving, I felt fairly confident the wallet was still there.
Then, one afternoon, it just stopped updating.
A few hours later, I got a call from the German police. Someone had handed in my wallet, claiming they'd found it near the concert. The story didn't quite add up, but the wallet was back, everything still inside.
The Trace Vault card came back too. Sawn cleanly in half.
The card, sawn in half, next to my other cards.
Our card has a built-in anti-stalking protection, required by law on any Find My-compatible device: if a tracker travels with someone for too long without its owner nearby, their iPhone eventually warns them. Whoever had my wallet must have gotten that warning and realized exactly what it meant, that I already knew where they were. They panicked, destroyed the card, and turned my wallet in to the local police themselves, with that same made-up story.
My friend's wallet was still missing, he had no tracker to follow. But the police suspected the theft was part of something bigger than one locker at one concert, and the address we'd given them became a real lead.
When they investigated the property, they found 27 stolen wallets and 43 stolen phones. My friend's wallet was among them, and he finally got it back too.
But by then, it was already too late for them.
The Same Card
This is what
I actually built.
Not a concept. Not a pitch. Just the same card, doing the same job, for anyone who needs it.
- 100-day returns
- No subscriptions, ever
- 5-year warranty
- Free worldwide shipping
- Recharge it, keep using it forever
- MFi, CE, FCC & RoHS certified
- So thin, it fits anywhere
- It's a tracker. It just doesn't look like one.
Trusted by 30,000+ customers across 17 countries.