Police have been unable to stem the tide of bike-riding thieves snatching phones out of the hands of Londoners as they make calls on the city’s streets, but shoppers are instead being warned to change their behaviour to adapt to the new reality instead.
A trial of painting “mind the grab” reminders on the pavements of Oxford Street, theoretically one of the planet’s top shopping destinations, is underway in London. Sponsored by retailer Currys, the design apes the long-established design of the “mind the gap” platform messages on London’s Underground commuter rail network.
Crimestoppers cited research when announcing the initiative on Wednesday that 88 per cent of Londoners consider mobile phone snatching — generally commissioned by a cyclist or motor-cyclist approaching distracted pedestrians using their phones in public, snatching them at speed as they ride by — a “significant problem”.
A spokesman for Currys, which retails mobile phones and other consumer technology, said of the phenomenon: “Phone theft isn’t just about losing a device – it’s frightening, invasive, and cuts people off from their loved ones, their money, and their daily lives… This trial aims to raise awareness and encourage behaviour changes to help people feel safer.”
The Daily Telegraph notes a mobile phone was stolen on average every fifteen minutes in London district the City of Westminster through 2024, and last month Nigel Farage launched his crime crackdown campaign, citing a survey which claimed one-in-three Londoners had been victims of phone snatchers. The Brexit leader said reports of such crime is grossly underreported in London as the public had lost faith in the police to take action.
In July, analysis of insurance industry figures claimed to have found that two-fifths of all mobile phone thefts across Europe take place in the United Kingdom. Of those thefts in the country, 42 per cent were in London, meaning the city was responsible for 16 per cent of all thefts in Europe, with the number of theft claims soaring 425 per cent in four years.
A police spokesman at the time of those figures explained the phone thefts were often the work of drug gangs, who had discovered it to be more profitable while also attracting less risk of involvement of the criminal justice system.
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