If this was a real issue, it would receive widespread coverage because hundreds of millions of people lean on the Find My network everyday to get things done.
I am back from another test: 3 hours hiking / walking in the woods ... having two original AirTags and two official clones with us. Two iPhones, the one that had the tags registered bluetooth turned off. Mine (bluetooth on) should have reported any location updates to the server. Nothing happened. Around 50 people passed us. Possible, but unlikely none carrying an iPhone? – status updates of the AirTags: none. Checked a few times on the way and afterwards at the parking lot. All showed "last seen" from when we have turned bluetooth off hours before (at home).If this was a real issue, it would receive widespread coverage because hundreds of millions of people lean on the Find My network everyday to get things done.
Yes, mine started working again a couple of hours after this update too!! Crazy it took so long.All looks like the recent update 17.4.1 has finally fixed the issue! 👍
There's a parallel rollout for 16.7.7 which most likely comes with a fix as well.
Still waiting for technical details from Apple.