A McDonald’s customer claimed that he and his friends took table markers as a “joke,” before the joke might indeed be on them.
TikTok creator @fartleek put up the short video on Friday, noting in their bio that “most of my videos are a joke.” Still, this video has drawn more than 876,400 views as of Monday.
In it, the creator shows a row of McDonald’s table markers, with an on-screen caption reading, “So me and my friends took McDonald’s table markers as a joke.”
@fartleek i need to know within 24 hours what i sould do or im going to jail. #fyp #fypシ #foryou #fypage #foryoupage #fypシ゚viral #viral #xyzbca #mcdonalds ♬ Hi – temoc
But then the video reveals what looks like information about a locator and an FCC ID number, with the on-screen caption stating, “And [then] I realized there are TRACKERS IN THEM.”
The video concludes, in an all-caps on-screen caption, “SOMEONE HELP ME. I DONT WANT TO GO TO JAIL OVER TABLE NUMBERS.”
It’s unclear based on just this video whether the trackers just work in a store, or if McDonald’s could perhaps use GPS to find their missing trackers, but the creator fretted about possible jail time all the same.
Commenters came in with opinions on what the creator did and how much trouble they might actually be in.
“As someone who works at a McDonald’s, they won’t even notice that they’re gone,” one user said.
“Trackers only work to find where [they] are in the store,” another offered. “They’re not like gps trackers so ur good.”
“They are basically just like a close range thing like Bluetooth,” chimed in a third. “They stop working outside the store.”
Someone else developed an elaborate scheme for returning them, writing, “Apply for a part time job, erase the evidence, turn off the cameras and place them back as you clean the floors.”
Another person said, “They cant find you but tbh you should just bring the back discreetly, these are super expensive.”
That led someone to say, “Who cares – multi million dollar company.”
That commenter then retorted, “You’re right and that makes it ok to do crime, i forgot.”
The Daily Dot has reached out to the creator via TikTok comment and to McDonald’s via email.