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A Cunning Distraction
Jan. 10th, 2012 03:34 amWe humans. We're so predictable. We imagine ourselves safe. We imagine ourselves surrounded by light and air and we don't like to open the windows when the wind is howling: it's bad enough to hear it from inside our secure rooms. We put ourselves into that false safety when we're in a place we've felt safe in before, even if the circumstances are different.
On Sunday, I went to the Wellcome Café to have coffee with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
fjm and her beloved. I had something to lend her: an old phone, since hers had been stolen, probably on the Tube, a couple of weeks earlier. We had a lovely chat, completely off the subject of my dissertation, and when they left, I settled down to write.
The Wellcome is a clean, well-lighted place. Not open late, like the one from the Hemingway story, but bright and cheerful and full, on a Sunday afternoon, of people meeting for reasons I couldn't guess but was happy to speculate on as I sat there taking in the murmur of the patrons.
And then, something happened.
Two young women, possibly Asian, walked over to my table. One of them stood directly behind me, which was disconcerting. The other stood on my left side. She had a Barclay's Cycle Hire flyer, which she put in front of my face. They both mumbled words in a language I didn't know. The one behind me reached around my left side and drank from my water glass (ew). Then she dipped her fingers in the sugar bowl on my table (double ew) and licked her fingers.
I did what many people would have done. I assumed they were homeless urchins and explained to them that the water was free and the sugar was free; I was working; please leave me alone.
It took perhaps a minute for it to register, after they slipped away and I went back to my writing, that all that antisocial behaviour had been a distraction. They'd stolen my iPhone. I immediately walked over to the security guard at the door and asked him if he'd seen two young women leave, as they'd just stolen my phone. After that, I gathered my things from the table, asked a couple of other patrons if they'd seen anything, and met the security guard at the desk to give a statement and call the police.
They spent about 10 minutes trying to find the number for the local police station. I don't know why they did that, when the 101 service for non-emergencies (no, the cops don't consider a mobile phone theft to be an emergency) has been so widely advertised, but that's neither here nor there. I pulled up all the information for my phone, began a track in Find My iPhone, and requested an email when the phone was found. I gave a statement to the police, who told me someone would be in touch soon with a case number and some information. The security guard led me to an administrative desk out of the main café (it's really bad publicity to have a clearly-spoken American woman explaining how her phone was just nicked in your café, don'tchaknow), where I rang O2 and had the IMEI blocked, rang G to explain I'd be late home, and rang J to ask what we should do.
A few months ago, we were very smart. We added a general list of items to our home contents insurance, and one of those items was my previous iPhone. J figured the proof of purchase for the new one would be enough for the insurance company and that the overage would be about £50, so we went off to Apple by way of O2 to procure a replacement phone and sim.
Why am I telling you this? It's not so you'll feel bad that my phone was stolen. I am just pleased the phone was insured. It's not so I can tell you how stupid I felt after the theft; trust me, I felt plenty stupid. It's because while this kind of thing might be more difficult for thieves to pull on me in the future, other people might not know what they do. So I'll outline what the police and the security folks at the Wellcome told me.
They are usually very young, between 15-18, or they appear very young.
They work in pairs.
They prey on people who look busy, who are alone, and who have something expensive out in plain view. (I'd just got off the phone with my son.)
They carry some small prop, like the cycle hire flyer.
They mumble, they put their hands in front of your face, they do whatever they can to distract the mark from the expensive item.
The prop is something for the mark to look at instead of the expensive item. They wave it around.
They do not make much noise.
Their aim is to confuse you into distraction, annoy you into telling them to go away, and then be angry enough that you don't look down for a few seconds -- enough time for them to slip away.
Even then, it can take a few minutes for you to put yourself together.
You can't believe how stupid you were to let these two people dupe you out of your expensive (usually) phone.
Maybe you're embarrassed and don't say anything right away; maybe you yell. It doesn't matter. They are already gone.
Two hours after my phone was stolen, it appeared on Find My iPhone, in a residential street in Dagenham. This information has been passed on to the police, since thieves apparently take things back to a central house before they're fenced. Once I'd discerned at least one location of the phone, I performed a remote wipe, since I keep everything on my phone.
Know your phone's serial number. Write it down and put it someplace safe. Keep it somewhere you can probably get to in a pinch.
Know your phone's IMEI. Same as above.
If you have an iPhone, get the free Find My iPhone app and activate it, but understand:
-it only works if the phone is on
-it only works if the phone has a signal
-thieves are smart enough to know how to turn an iPhone off.
Back Up Your Data. I'm enough of an Apple geek that I subscribe to the (free) iCloud backup service, which makes sure your data is safe and easily downloadable to another Apple device. But no matter what kind of phone you have, make sure your data is backed up somewhere. Your computer, a cloud service, whatever there is, you back it up.
Keep your phone in a case, and keep it close to your body, particularly if you have a white iPhone, which is apparently the most nickable phone in the UK. Ordinarily, I keep my phone in a travel wallet around my neck, but I'd taken the wallet off while chatting with F & E and had put the phone on the table rather than back in the wallet after I got off the phone with G.
If anybody walks up to you, immediately put your hand on your phone or other valuable item. It's OK to be suspicious of strangers (duh!).
My phone was a white iPhone 4S, serial number DNPGPB0FDTDV. The IMEI, now blocked in the UK and I think Europe, was 012021007444672. It was less than a month old.
On Sunday, I went to the Wellcome Café to have coffee with
fjm and her beloved. I had something to lend her: an old phone, since hers had been stolen, probably on the Tube, a couple of weeks earlier. We had a lovely chat, completely off the subject of my dissertation, and when they left, I settled down to write. The Wellcome is a clean, well-lighted place. Not open late, like the one from the Hemingway story, but bright and cheerful and full, on a Sunday afternoon, of people meeting for reasons I couldn't guess but was happy to speculate on as I sat there taking in the murmur of the patrons.
And then, something happened.
Two young women, possibly Asian, walked over to my table. One of them stood directly behind me, which was disconcerting. The other stood on my left side. She had a Barclay's Cycle Hire flyer, which she put in front of my face. They both mumbled words in a language I didn't know. The one behind me reached around my left side and drank from my water glass (ew). Then she dipped her fingers in the sugar bowl on my table (double ew) and licked her fingers.
I did what many people would have done. I assumed they were homeless urchins and explained to them that the water was free and the sugar was free; I was working; please leave me alone.
It took perhaps a minute for it to register, after they slipped away and I went back to my writing, that all that antisocial behaviour had been a distraction. They'd stolen my iPhone. I immediately walked over to the security guard at the door and asked him if he'd seen two young women leave, as they'd just stolen my phone. After that, I gathered my things from the table, asked a couple of other patrons if they'd seen anything, and met the security guard at the desk to give a statement and call the police.
They spent about 10 minutes trying to find the number for the local police station. I don't know why they did that, when the 101 service for non-emergencies (no, the cops don't consider a mobile phone theft to be an emergency) has been so widely advertised, but that's neither here nor there. I pulled up all the information for my phone, began a track in Find My iPhone, and requested an email when the phone was found. I gave a statement to the police, who told me someone would be in touch soon with a case number and some information. The security guard led me to an administrative desk out of the main café (it's really bad publicity to have a clearly-spoken American woman explaining how her phone was just nicked in your café, don'tchaknow), where I rang O2 and had the IMEI blocked, rang G to explain I'd be late home, and rang J to ask what we should do.
A few months ago, we were very smart. We added a general list of items to our home contents insurance, and one of those items was my previous iPhone. J figured the proof of purchase for the new one would be enough for the insurance company and that the overage would be about £50, so we went off to Apple by way of O2 to procure a replacement phone and sim.
Why am I telling you this? It's not so you'll feel bad that my phone was stolen. I am just pleased the phone was insured. It's not so I can tell you how stupid I felt after the theft; trust me, I felt plenty stupid. It's because while this kind of thing might be more difficult for thieves to pull on me in the future, other people might not know what they do. So I'll outline what the police and the security folks at the Wellcome told me.
They are usually very young, between 15-18, or they appear very young.
They work in pairs.
They prey on people who look busy, who are alone, and who have something expensive out in plain view. (I'd just got off the phone with my son.)
They carry some small prop, like the cycle hire flyer.
They mumble, they put their hands in front of your face, they do whatever they can to distract the mark from the expensive item.
The prop is something for the mark to look at instead of the expensive item. They wave it around.
They do not make much noise.
Their aim is to confuse you into distraction, annoy you into telling them to go away, and then be angry enough that you don't look down for a few seconds -- enough time for them to slip away.
Even then, it can take a few minutes for you to put yourself together.
You can't believe how stupid you were to let these two people dupe you out of your expensive (usually) phone.
Maybe you're embarrassed and don't say anything right away; maybe you yell. It doesn't matter. They are already gone.
Two hours after my phone was stolen, it appeared on Find My iPhone, in a residential street in Dagenham. This information has been passed on to the police, since thieves apparently take things back to a central house before they're fenced. Once I'd discerned at least one location of the phone, I performed a remote wipe, since I keep everything on my phone.
Know your phone's serial number. Write it down and put it someplace safe. Keep it somewhere you can probably get to in a pinch.
Know your phone's IMEI. Same as above.
If you have an iPhone, get the free Find My iPhone app and activate it, but understand:
-it only works if the phone is on
-it only works if the phone has a signal
-thieves are smart enough to know how to turn an iPhone off.
Back Up Your Data. I'm enough of an Apple geek that I subscribe to the (free) iCloud backup service, which makes sure your data is safe and easily downloadable to another Apple device. But no matter what kind of phone you have, make sure your data is backed up somewhere. Your computer, a cloud service, whatever there is, you back it up.
Keep your phone in a case, and keep it close to your body, particularly if you have a white iPhone, which is apparently the most nickable phone in the UK. Ordinarily, I keep my phone in a travel wallet around my neck, but I'd taken the wallet off while chatting with F & E and had put the phone on the table rather than back in the wallet after I got off the phone with G.
If anybody walks up to you, immediately put your hand on your phone or other valuable item. It's OK to be suspicious of strangers (duh!).
My phone was a white iPhone 4S, serial number DNPGPB0FDTDV. The IMEI, now blocked in the UK and I think Europe, was 012021007444672. It was less than a month old.
