A 32-year-old man riding an e-bike has been charged with robbery after Metropolitan Police officers stopped him and found 11 mobile phones and rolls of tin foil in his possession.
The arrest on 9 September came in the middle of an e-bike phone theft crackdown — the Met’s largest-ever operation against mobile phone crime, a month-long effort that ended with more than 700 arrests and hundreds of suspected stolen handsets seized across the capital.
The man was subsequently charged with robbery and remanded in custody. Alongside the 11 handsets, officers recovered the rolls of tin foil.
Month-long operation targeted whole criminal chain
The arrest was one of more than 700 made during Operation Reckoning, which ran from 1 to 30 September and was described by the force as its biggest operation yet against mobile phone crime. Officers targeted every stage of what police call an organised criminal chain, from street thieves snatching handsets to the handlers who collect them and the exporters who ship them abroad.
Many of those arrested were already known to police as repeat offenders. As well as the phones, officers seized drugs, weapons and cash, and took more than 110 illegal e-bikes off the road.
Detectives also visited 220 second-hand phone shops across the capital during September, gathering intelligence and building relationships with legitimate traders in an effort to close off outlets for stolen devices.
Why thieves wrap stolen phones in tin foil
The rolls of tin foil found with the e-bike rider point to a well-known trick of the phone-theft trade. Wrapping a handset in foil creates a crude Faraday cage, a conductive shield that blocks the radio signals a phone needs to reach the mobile network.
With no signal, the phone cannot make or receive calls or texts and cannot use mobile data. Crucially for thieves, it also cannot be located through tracking tools such as Find My iPhone or Android’s Find My Device, and its owner cannot remotely lock or wipe it. A silenced phone will not even ring if the victim tries calling it.
Blocking the signal buys the criminal chain valuable time. Handsets typically move quickly from the street thief to handlers and on to exporters, often within hours, before victims have a chance to track, lock or wipe them.
Thefts fall to four-year low
The Met says the sustained pressure is working. Phone theft and robbery offences are now at a four-year low, with 3,963 offences recorded in August, the lowest August figure since 2022.
The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, said 16,000 fewer mobile phones had been stolen over the past year and put the value of the criminal market in stolen handsets at around £50 million.
Commander Andy Featherstone, the Met’s lead for tackling phone theft, said: “London is becoming a much harder place to steal phones.” He added: “The risks are increasing, the opportunities are shrinking, and we are coming after you.”
Raids, charges and jail terms
In a separate operation on 11 September, officers raided a shop in north London, an investigation that led them to an address where more than 100 suspected stolen phones were found. Five people were arrested and charged over the discovery.
Read more: Over 100 suspected stolen phones seized in north London raid
Later in the month, three men were jailed for a combined 25 years for handling stolen phones, in a case police described as the UK’s biggest stolen-phone smuggling network.
Read more: Three men jailed for 25 years over UK’s biggest stolen-phone smuggling network
The force has also been working directly with manufacturers, including sharing intelligence with Apple to make stolen devices harder to reactivate and resell, and put a particular focus on hotspot areas such as Westminster, where phone snatches have been most concentrated.
Read more: Met’s biggest-ever phone theft crackdown ends with 700 arrests and hundreds of stolen mobiles seized
How to make your phone a harder target
Police advise Londoners to take a few simple steps to protect their handsets. Use a strong passcode together with fingerprint or face unlock, and make sure tracking features such as Find My iPhone or Android’s Find My Device are switched on before anything goes wrong.
Note down your phone’s IMEI number, the 15-digit identity code found by dialling *#06#, and keep it somewhere safe. If your phone is stolen, report it to the police and your network provider straight away so the handset can be blocked and the theft logged.
Stay alert in busy areas, keep phones out of sight when not in use and avoid leaving handsets on café or pub tables. Anyone offered a cheap second-hand phone with no box, receipt or charger is urged to think twice, as it may be stolen.
The Metropolitan Police has published full details of the operation on its official news site.
