5 ms·

Is it really insane? That is less than 200 per day, in a city of 15 million people.. a single gang of 20 thieves could likely manage that! The real question is,

by clort 1mo ago

Is it really insane? That is less than 200 per day, in a city of 15 million people.. a single gang of 20 thieves could likely manage that! The real question is, how does this compare to other cities of this size and demographics?

iamnothere 1mo ago
Why compare demographics?
- pavel_lishin 1mo ago
  I would expect a city that's mostly retirement communities to have less snatch-and-run thefts than a city where tourists make up a large part of the population at any given time.
  - aliclark 1mo ago
    Retired people a probably quite easy targets in this scenario.
    - brewdad 1mo ago
      Not if they drive everywhere
  - iamnothere 1mo ago
    Interestingly, Tokyo has a much larger population than London with a very low crime rate. I can’t find specific numbers on stolen phones (only lost phone statistics are published) but robberies/muggings are 0.04 per 1,000 yearly versus London’s 2.83 per 1,000. Seoul has a similar rate to Tokyo, 0.4 to 0.5. Also, is there even a single city of London’s size that is mostly retirement communities?
    - Melatonic 1mo ago
      The kind of crime in Tokyo that is happening may also just not be reported
      - iamnothere 1mo ago
        In Beijing robberies are 0.55 per 1,000. In Taipei it’s an unbelievable 0.0036 per 1,000, although general theft is higher at 2.12 (compared to London at 52.9). Are all these countries underreporting? Singapore is 0.01 per 1,000. Hanoi doesn’t have published statistics but its Numbeo crime index (calculated from surveys) is 33.8 versus London at 55.3. I think we can stop excusing London’s numbers. Want a non-Asian country in case Asians are somehow magical beings who don’t do robberies? Ottawa is 0.11 to 0.13 per 1,000. Vancouver is 0.73 per 1,000. Sydney is 0.13 to 0.15 per 1,000. Dubai is 0.03 to 0.045 per 1,000. London is supposed to be a global city on par with many of these others. So what is going wrong? It’s hard to get good stats on Cairo, but its crime index is lower than London somehow, despite the higher levels of poverty. Same with Islamabad and Jaipur.
        perpetuallunch 1mo ago
        One would have to literally have one’s head in the sand to not know what’s going wrong in London. Or Melbourne. Or Los Angeles or New York.
        deleted 1mo ago
        [deleted]
        djtango 1mo ago
        It always shocks me how people like to excuse crime in London. 70000 phones snatched in a year. 3000 stabbings a year. The phone snatchings are so common that I can name several victims from completely different walks of life. Maybe the most mental incident was when a colleague's phone was snatched then subsequently ditched on the floor cos it was too old to be worth the trouble of fencing... As a native Londoner I didn't realise how much baggage I carried wrt crime until I moved to Singapore and realised that leaving your front door open, your car unlocked or your phone on a restaurant table aren't crimes you apparently deserve to be immediately punished for. It's kind of nice knowing that children and the elderly can go about their day without fear of crime or that women can be unsupervised at night without fear of violence. It's actually very liberating being free from the tyranny of crime.
hluska 1mo ago
What exactly are you arguing and why? 70,000 is a lot of stolen phones. The number of thieves is irrelevant.
Markoff 1mo ago
200 SNATCHED phones a day is insane number, I seriously doubt in 10 times smaller European cities you will find 20 people per day with someone snatching their phone
__alias 1mo ago
I'd say it's a lot higher than this. This is just the reported numbers. I live in London and I'm fairly careless. Yesterday when I hopped onto a bus a driver told me I was crazy for holding my phone out infront of me and that it would be snatched if I kept that up. I could list 10 people I know that have had their phone stolen at some point in the last few years. I've also seen it happen several times. It's very common.
- notsmarthuh 1mo ago
  [flagged]
deleted 1mo ago
[deleted]
Am4TIfIsER0ppos 1mo ago
Why is there a single one? If zero traffic deaths is an achievable goal then surely zero thefts are too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vision_Zero https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vision_Zero
djtango 1mo ago
Let me check my maths... So population of london is 9M Say your network and you is 250 people. (friends, colleague, family, neighbours, community) Probability (P) of not being chosen[0]: 1-200/9M Probability of your network (PN) not being chosen[1]: P^250 Probability of your network not being chosen everyday for 1 year: PN^365 = 13% I'm not very confident with statistics but if I assembled that correctly that means in any given year, you'd only expect 13% odds that no one you care about was a victim of phone snatching crime, That's kind of bleak tbh [0] realistically the odds are a lot worse and the probability won't be uniformly distributed: people living in Surrey or Chiswick are going to have different odds to someone who lives in Soho or works in Central London. Suddenly the "at risk" population can get pretty small when you think about it because grannies and 2 year olds aren't walking around Warren Street station at peak theft hours with their phone out. [1] I realise that this doesn't handle replacement but for big population and small subset this should approximate

by clort 1mo ago

iamnothere 1mo ago

Why compare demographics?

pavel_lishin 1mo ago
I would expect a city that's mostly retirement communities to have less snatch-and-run thefts than a city where tourists make up a large part of the population at any given time.
- aliclark 1mo ago
  Retired people a probably quite easy targets in this scenario.
  - brewdad 1mo ago
    Not if they drive everywhere
- iamnothere 1mo ago
  Interestingly, Tokyo has a much larger population than London with a very low crime rate. I can’t find specific numbers on stolen phones (only lost phone statistics are published) but robberies/muggings are 0.04 per 1,000 yearly versus London’s 2.83 per 1,000. Seoul has a similar rate to Tokyo, 0.4 to 0.5. Also, is there even a single city of London’s size that is mostly retirement communities?
  - Melatonic 1mo ago
    The kind of crime in Tokyo that is happening may also just not be reported
    - iamnothere 1mo ago
      In Beijing robberies are 0.55 per 1,000. In Taipei it’s an unbelievable 0.0036 per 1,000, although general theft is higher at 2.12 (compared to London at 52.9). Are all these countries underreporting? Singapore is 0.01 per 1,000. Hanoi doesn’t have published statistics but its Numbeo crime index (calculated from surveys) is 33.8 versus London at 55.3. I think we can stop excusing London’s numbers. Want a non-Asian country in case Asians are somehow magical beings who don’t do robberies? Ottawa is 0.11 to 0.13 per 1,000. Vancouver is 0.73 per 1,000. Sydney is 0.13 to 0.15 per 1,000. Dubai is 0.03 to 0.045 per 1,000. London is supposed to be a global city on par with many of these others. So what is going wrong? It’s hard to get good stats on Cairo, but its crime index is lower than London somehow, despite the higher levels of poverty. Same with Islamabad and Jaipur.
      - perpetuallunch 1mo ago
        One would have to literally have one’s head in the sand to not know what’s going wrong in London. Or Melbourne. Or Los Angeles or New York.
      - deleted 1mo ago
        [deleted]
      - djtango 1mo ago
        It always shocks me how people like to excuse crime in London. 70000 phones snatched in a year. 3000 stabbings a year. The phone snatchings are so common that I can name several victims from completely different walks of life. Maybe the most mental incident was when a colleague's phone was snatched then subsequently ditched on the floor cos it was too old to be worth the trouble of fencing... As a native Londoner I didn't realise how much baggage I carried wrt crime until I moved to Singapore and realised that leaving your front door open, your car unlocked or your phone on a restaurant table aren't crimes you apparently deserve to be immediately punished for. It's kind of nice knowing that children and the elderly can go about their day without fear of crime or that women can be unsupervised at night without fear of violence. It's actually very liberating being free from the tyranny of crime.

hluska 1mo ago

What exactly are you arguing and why? 70,000 is a lot of stolen phones. The number of thieves is irrelevant.

Markoff 1mo ago

200 SNATCHED phones a day is insane number, I seriously doubt in 10 times smaller European cities you will find 20 people per day with someone snatching their phone

__alias 1mo ago

I'd say it's a lot higher than this. This is just the reported numbers. I live in London and I'm fairly careless. Yesterday when I hopped onto a bus a driver told me I was crazy for holding my phone out infront of me and that it would be snatched if I kept that up. I could list 10 people I know that have had their phone stolen at some point in the last few years. I've also seen it happen several times. It's very common.

notsmarthuh 1mo ago
[flagged]

deleted 1mo ago

[deleted]

Am4TIfIsER0ppos 1mo ago

Why is there a single one? If zero traffic deaths is an achievable goal then surely zero thefts are too. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vision_Zero https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vision_Zero

djtango 1mo ago

Let me check my maths... So population of london is 9M Say your network and you is 250 people. (friends, colleague, family, neighbours, community) Probability (P) of not being chosen[0]: 1-200/9M Probability of your network (PN) not being chosen[1]: P^250 Probability of your network not being chosen everyday for 1 year: PN^365 = 13% I'm not very confident with statistics but if I assembled that correctly that means in any given year, you'd only expect 13% odds that no one you care about was a victim of phone snatching crime, That's kind of bleak tbh [0] realistically the odds are a lot worse and the probability won't be uniformly distributed: people living in Surrey or Chiswick are going to have different odds to someone who lives in Soho or works in Central London. Suddenly the "at risk" population can get pretty small when you think about it because grannies and 2 year olds aren't walking around Warren Street station at peak theft hours with their phone out. [1] I realise that this doesn't handle replacement but for big population and small subset this should approximate