London’s Metropolitan Police has recently launched a crackdown on the “industrial-scale” crime of mobile phone-snatching, resulting in 230 arrests and more than 1,000 mobile phones seized. The police deployed plain-clothed officers in hotspot areas such as the West End and Westminster, and used tracking technology to recover phones and catch criminals. Addressing the problem of the £50m-a-year trade in stolen phones across the capital, those responsible for the thefts, handling and criminal supply are all being targeted.
This action by the Metropolitan Police has come as police and tech companies pledge a joint effort against smartphone theft. During a meeting on Thursday, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper requested Apple, Samsung and Google to join forces with the police to enhance anti-theft measures and make smartphones essentially worthless to criminals.
The way in which the police responded to a recent phone-snatching victim was “markedly different from what other Londoners say they have experienced,” according to Richard, the victim. The police investigated after visiting his home and tracking the last known location of the device but were unable to recover his phone.
The Met’s Cdr Owain Richards remarked that phone theft is being seen on an “industrial scale”, and called for other agencies and the government to take more action. The force wants the phone industry to prevent stolen handsets from being reconnected to cloud services to make them useless. The Met also claimed it recently prosecuted four members of a gang who had been caught handling over 5,000 stolen phones and were sentenced to a total of 18 years in prison.
The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, said the Met was dealing with mobile phone theft in London and he was determined to eliminate it. The police has advised the general public to register all phones with immobilise.com, set up strong passwords, turn off message previews and take note of the phone’s IMEI number
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