🔗 Share this article

Police report they have broken up an worldwide criminal network suspected of moving as many as 40,000 stolen cell phones from the UK to Mainland China during the previous twelve months.

As part of what London's police force calls the UK's biggest operation against phone thefts, a group of 18 have been arrested and more than 2K stolen devices located.

Law enforcement suspect the criminal group could be responsible for shipping up to one half of all handsets taken in the city - in which most phones are stolen in the United Kingdom.

The Investigation Initiated by An Individual Device

The investigation was triggered after a target located a pilfered device the previous year.

It was actually on Christmas Eve and a individual electronically tracked their stolen iPhone to a distribution center in the vicinity of the international hub, an investigator explained. The personnel there was willing to assist and they found the handset was in a crate, together with nearly 900 additional handsets.

Officers discovered the vast majority of the handsets had been stolen and in this instance were being sent to Hong Kong. Subsequent deliveries were then seized and officers used scientific analysis on the packages to identify two suspects.

Intense Apprehensions

When the probe focused on the pair of suspects, police bodycam footage captured officers, some with Tasers drawn, conducting a dramatic roadside apprehension of a car. Within, authorities found phones wrapped in foil - a method by criminals to move pilfered phones undetected.

The individuals, both citizens of Afghanistan in their thirties, were charged with conspiring to receive stolen goods and working together to conceal or remove stolen merchandise.

During their detention, numerous devices were found in their automobile, and roughly an additional 2,000 phones were found at addresses associated with them. Another individual, a individual in his late twenties Indian national, has subsequently been charged with the identical crimes.

Increasing Phone Theft Problem

The number of phones stolen in the city has almost tripled in the last four years, from over 28K in the year 2020, to over 80K in this year. The majority of all the phones stolen in the UK are now stolen in London.

Over twenty million people come to the city annually and tourist hotspots such as the West End and political hub are prolific for phone snatching and theft.

A rising desire for second-hand phones, domestically and internationally, is believed to be a major driver underlying the surge in pilfering - and numerous targets eventually never getting their handsets back.

Lucrative Underground Operation

We're hearing that various perpetrators are stopping dealing drugs and moving on to the phone business because it's more profitable, an authority figure remarked. Upon snatching a handset and it's priced in the hundreds, it's evident why perpetrators who are proactive and aim to benefit from new crimes are turning to that world.

Senior officers said the criminal gang particularly focused on devices from Apple because of their financial gain abroad.

The probe discovered low-level criminals were being rewarded up to three hundred pounds per handset - and authorities stated stolen devices are being marketed in Mainland China for up to 4K GBP per unit, given they are connected and more appealing for those seeking to evade restrictions.

Law Enforcement Action

This marks the most significant effort on mobile phone theft and robbery in the UK in the most extraordinary set of operations the police force has ever executed, a top official announced. We've dismantled illegal organizations at each tier from petty criminals to global criminal syndicates sending abroad tens of thousands of stolen devices annually.

Many individuals of phone theft have been critical of authorities - like the metropolitan force - for not doing enough.

Frequent complaints involve authorities failing to assist when individuals report the immediate whereabouts of their pilfered device to the authorities using Apple's Find My iPhone or comparable monitoring systems.

Individual Story

Last year, a person had her device stolen on a central London thoroughfare, in central London. She told she now feels uneasy when coming to the metropolis.

It's quite unsettling visiting the area and clearly I'm uncertain who might be nearby. I'm worried about my purse, I'm anxious about my device, she revealed. I think authorities could be implementing far greater - possibly establishing additional security cameras or checking if possibilities exist they employ plainclothes agents just to tackle this problem. In my opinion owing to the quantity of incidents and the number of individuals reaching out with them, they are short on the funding and capability to deal with every incident.

For its part, the city's law enforcement - which has employed online networks with various videos of officers tackling handset thieves in {recent months|the past few months|the last several weeks