Home Office launches anti-theft 'msg'

Govt warns of mobile freezing

Friday, 22, Jun 2007 12:00

The Home Office has launched a new campaign designed to deter mobile phone theft.

With the mobile phone industry now meeting targets to block stolen mobile phones within 48 hours, the Home Office has launched a new campaign based on the message: "If you buy a stolen mobile phone you'll waste your money and look foolish".

The £500,000 campaign is targeted specially at 16 to 25-year-olds, prompting the department to employ "txt lngwij" and pictures created from punctuation.

Adverts to promote the R U getting the msg? campaign will appear in magazines including Heat, Zoo and Nuts and websites such as Ebay, Loot and Gumtree.

The Home Office will also target young people by scrawling the message on phone boxes and litter bins from Monday June 25.

Crime reduction minister Baroness Scotland launched the campaign today, proclaiming it a "great example" of the government's efforts to address crime at its root.

Baroness Scotland said: "Effective and imaginative government communications have played a key role in driving down crime by over 35 per cent over the last ten years.

"By working behind the scenes with the mobile phone industry to achieve ambitious targets on blocking stolen phones and by passing legislation outlawing re-programming a mobile, we have paved the way for this savvy campaign that promises to deliver real results.

"I want this campaign to take the bottom out of the illicit phone market entirely. Young people should be left in no doubt that stolen phones won't work anymore.

"The prize will be a dramatic reduction in mobile phone crime overall making young people safer."

Jack Wraith, chairman of the Mobile Industry Crime Action Forum, said the mobile phone industry was sending a clear message to phone thieves by blocking stolen handsets with 48 hours.

In April it became an offence to even offer to re-program a blocked mobile phone.