Met Police accuses Apple of failing to check if iPhones are stolen

The Met Police has accused Apple of failing to stop stolen iPhones from being traded in as the two sides clash over an epidemic of phone thefts.

The London police service told MPs that the tech giant neglects to use a national database of stolen devices that could stop it from accepting snatched phones.

Apple allows people to trade in old iPhones and get credit towards new devices, with people able to get up to £670 off using this system.

The Met said Apple had access to the National Mobile Phone Register (NMPR), a database of stolen devices used to return recovered phones to their owners, but claimed the tech giant did not monitor the register for traded in devices.

“Apple already have access to NMPR and use it every day to check the network status of trade in devices, but they do not check for theft or take action,” it said.

It comes after Apple urged the Met to focus on “traditional policing” by following up on reports of stolen phones made by the company.

More than 80,000 phones were reported stolen in London last year, up from 64,000 the prior year. More than three quarters of stolen devices end up abroad, with many stripped for parts.

The Met Police has estimated the cost of replacing stolen phones, borne by users and their insurers, at £50m in 2024.

In response to the Met’s claims, Apple highlighted systems it had introduced to crack down on phone thieves.

The company has launched a stolen device protection feature that blocks criminals from wiping phones even when they have learned a phone’s passcode, and a setting that locks iPhones to the original owner’s Apple account.

Apple said it was considering whether to block the use of a phone’s IMEI number – a unique 15-digit identifier that can connect that phone to an overseas mobile network – once the device was registered as stolen.

Police believe up to three quarters of stolen phones are moved abroad, with 28pc ending up in China or Hong Kong and many in Algeria.

But the company has warned that IMEI number blocking could still be abused by people impersonating the phone’s owner and making false claims of theft.

It has also said that these measures would not stop phones from being broken down for parts.

Mobile networks have separately accused Apple of “undermining” efforts to stop phone thefts from retailers by refusing to “brick” devices that are stolen from operators’ own stores.

Around 80pc of smartphones reported as stolen to the Met Police are iPhones.

Apple has previously accused the Met Police of failing to fully investigate those thefts.

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Apple executive Gary Davis told MPs in June: “I would want to make sure that as part of all of that the Met Police continues to do traditional policing, which means sending requests to us for stolen devices and Apple responding to those requests for stolen devices. We are not seeing that.”

Chi Onwurah, the head of the Commons Science, Innovation and Technology Committee, has written to Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood criticising Apple, Google and Samsung for their approach.

The Met has warned that there are growing links between knife crime, child exploitation gangs, drugs and mobile phone theft, with some gangs “pivoting” from selling illegal drugs to stealing handsets.

A Neighbourhood Watch survey released last week found that 28pc of phone thefts were snatched from a user’s hand, pocket or bag.

Another quarter were covertly pickpocketed, while 22pc had been left unattended. Two thirds of thefts happened in the afternoon or evening.

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