NYPD PHONE FURY
Says cell industry must crack down on black market
The NYPD says the cell phone industry must do more to crack down on a thriving black market for stolen phones by making them completely useless once they have been ripped off.
Over the past few years, about 39% of robberies of individuals involved a stolen phone, according to the NYPD. The city recorded 12,913 robberies in 2018, down 7.7% from 2017 and 16.9% from 2016. At the same time, robberies of cell phone stores declined to 71 last year compared with 82 in 2017 and 87 in 2016.
A spotlight has been cast on cell phone robberies since Feb. 12, when Detective Brian Simonsen was shot dead by a fellow officer during the robbery of a Richmond Hill, Queens, T-Mobile store.
Suspect Christopher Ransom, 27, had moments earlier forced two employees into a back room. Ransom, who was shot eight times and survived, has been charged with Sialleged monsen’s murder, along with lookout Jagger Freeman, 25.
It is not clear if Ransom was involved in other Queens cell phone store robberies.
What is clear to police, however, is that the cellular technology industry hasn’t done enough to prevent stolen phones from being reactivated and marketable for thieves.
“At the hospital … I was shocked to learn that carriers will activate stolen phones,” said Michael Palladino, head of the Detectives’ Endowment Association, referring to the night Simonsen was shot.. “They could easily kill the criminal market for these devices by denying activation, but they can’t resist the revenue stream.
“If their policy was different, our detective would be alive today.”
The Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association, a trade group that works with law enforcement as well as carriers and manufacturers, says that when cell phones are reported stolen, service carriers disable the devices and add their serial numbers to a blacklist database. That database is maintained by a cell phone industry association called GSMA.
As of the end of 2017, there were more than 273 million smartphones in the United States.
The blacklist has been credited with acting as a robbery deterrent, but only some police departments track cell phone thefts as a separate category, so the list is incomplete.
The Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association’s vice president for technology and cybersecurity, John Marinho, said the major carriers, including T-Mobile, Sprint, AT&T and Verizon, along with U.S. Cellular, provide service to 97% of all cell phones in the United States and they use the blacklist.
Smaller carriers in New York City, such as Boost Mobile, Cricket Wireless and MetroPCS, are subsidiaries of the major ones and also use the blacklist, Marinho said.
But blacklisting a phone blocks only outgoing and incoming calls. Stolen devices can still be used to download apps and for Wi-Fi connections.
And, the NYPD points out, if stolen phones turn up in another country, the blacklist is irrelevant. For instance, an iPhone can fetch $2,000 in Brazil and can be reactivated to place and receive calls.
Carriers in some countries have agreed to blacklist stolen phones, but the Caribbean, Southeast Asia and Latin America remain black market hotspots.
One Police Department official said that even when stolen smartphones remain in the United States, the NYPD has found that too often carriers are slow to blacklist the serial numbers, officially known as IMEI numbers.
Police are exasperated by the thriving black market in stolen cell phones and want manufacturers and providers to put prevention before profit. “We should not have a situation where a device is stolen and service providers and manufacturers alike continue to provide services and fees and make money off that device,” NYPD Chief of Detectives Dermot Shea said. “I think that’s a problem.
“We did find phones going to the Middle East, to Europe, to South America, to Asia, but the vast, vast, vast majority were right here … and were still being used and still generating revenue and still downloading apps and still making phone calls,” Shea said.
Apple, which makes the iPhone, said its customers can lock their devices if they are lost or stolen, and that its Find My iPhone app often helps police recover stolen devices. Other manufacturers have similar technology.
Marinho said 5G wireless technology, with which phones will be equipped beginning later this year, will enable carriers to disable Wi-Fi capabilities on stolen phones. However, the rollout of this technology is expected to take place over several years.