Giving in to the pressure from the New York prosecutors George Gascón and Eric Schneiderman, Google and Microsoft will finally follow Apple in adding an anti-theft “kill switch” to combat smartphone theft.
The New York Times reports that US law enforcement officials have noticed a dramatic drop in iPhones thefts in San Francisco – 38 percent, and London – 24 percent, after the Activation Lock feature launch in Apple’s iOS 7 software.
In New York, iPhones theft were down by 19 percent in the first 5 months, while those involving grand larcenies (amounting to $1,000 or more) dropped by 29 percent. On the contrary, thefts of Samsung devices have increased.
San Francisco District Attorney – George Gascon and New York State Attorney General – Eric Schneiderman have been leading the push to include kill switches in smartphones to curb robberies and thefts.
The two believe that there would be a significant drop in theft rates if most of the smartphones had a kill switch, due to the probability of a stolen smartphone being useful turns less, with the value greatly diminishing.
“These statistics validate what we always knew to be true, that a technological solution has the potential to end the victimization of wireless consumers everywhere,” said Gascon.
“We must ensure these solutions are deployed in a more effective manner that does not rely on consumers to seek them out an turn them on, but the fact that virtually the entire industry has responded to our call to action is an indication that we are well on our way to ending this public safety crisis.”
Eric Schneiderman said “If [smartphones] can be canceled like the equivalent of canceling a credit card, these are going to be the equivalent of stealing a paperweight.”
Some of the other companies who have recently agreed to integrate “kill switches” include HTC, Samsung, Motorola, Nokia, T-Mobile, U.S. Cellular, Verizon and Sprint.
