Police and tech sector vow to work together to tackle phone theft
The Home Secretary brought representatives from law enforcement and tech companies together on Thursday to discuss the growing problem snatch theft.
Police and tech companies have pledged to work closer together to tackle smartphone theft after it was revealed the Metropolitan Police seized more than 1,000 stolen devices in one week.
During a summit on Thursday, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper urged tech companies including Apple, Samsung and Google to join forces with police to improve anti-theft measures and make smartphones effectively worthless to criminals.
She also promised to legislate where necessary to ensure the police had the necessary powers to tackle phone theft.
Ms Cooper said: “Over the last few years, mobile phone thefts have shot up – often driven by organised crime – leaving our streets feeling less safe. That has to change.
“I brought together tech companies and law enforcement today to pursue stronger action against organised criminality and to prevent phone theft on our streets. It was a significant step forward in addressing the need to come together as partners to disrupt, design-out and disincentivise these damaging crimes.”
The meeting, which brought together tech companies, the police, the National Crime Agency and the Mayor of London followed a 43% increase in street crime, which the Home Office said was driven by a rise in smartphones being snatched from people’s hands.
It also followed an intensive operation by the Met, which saw 230 arrests and 1,000 devices seized in a single week.
Other forces are expected to follow suit and increase enforcement activity across the country, the Home Office said.
Sir Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London, praised the work of the Met, but said it was not possible to “arrest our way out of mobile phone crime”.
He said: “I welcome recent security updates by leading mobile phone companies that we supported and we spoke today about how we can build on those and work together to ‘design out’ the scourge of mobile phone crime to build a safer London for all.”
During Thursday’s summit with Ms Cooper, Met Deputy Commissioner Dame Lynne Owens was expected to raise improving security on phones to prevent stolen devices from being easily resold, the force said.
Officers also want to work with industry members to prevent stolen handsets from re-connecting to cloud services, and to make a device’s international mobile equipment identity (IMEI) number viewable on its lockscreen.
Network providers can use the unique 15-digit IMEI to block the device if it is stolen.
Phone-tracking data and intelligence is being used to trace people using stolen devices.
Last year four members of a gang were sentenced to “a combined 18 years” after handling more than 5,000 stolen phones, the force said.
They were tracked down after multiple victims reported phone theft in the same location, it added.
Following Thursday’s summit, tech executives said they were committed to tackling phone theft and welcomed the opportunity for further “collaboration” with law enforcement.
