What Happens to Stolen Bicycles? • Hacker News Board

Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#91

Post by brown9-2 » Tue, Aug 28, 2012, 7:30 PM UTC

TallGuyShort wrote: post #88

fffggg wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I just know that is a stolen car" Which is why criminals do not charge half of its used value -- they charge 100% of the used value just like everyone else. You cannot tell a stolen bike on craigslist apart from a non-stolen bike based on the price alone. The problem of stolen cars is addressed through licensing and registration. Not to mention, bicycles do not have a reliable and standardized VIN system like cars d…

I lived in a town that required all bikes to be registered and licensed, and all sales of bikes to go through the local government. It was such a big pain that I would rather just live with the higher risk of theft and the lack of enforcement.

What town was this?

Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#92

Post by agumonkey » Tue, Aug 28, 2012, 7:32 PM UTC

pavel_lishin wrote: post #44

agumonkey wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For a reason I can't reply to you brk but I used the same ideas. My last question was about communicating openly or not about it. - Openly would make robber aware and probably come up with attacks or blocking means, but that would surely render their activities a lot more complicated. Could be mass-produced. - Secretly a few people would have it and use it as bait, and authorities being aware of the scheme would casu…

Sometimes I don't see a reply link on certain comments; clicking on the direct link for those comments, though, shows me the "reply" button.

I tried that, without success. It's probably a karma related behavior

Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#93

Post by ChuckMcM » Tue, Aug 28, 2012, 7:33 PM UTC

I love priceonomics, every time I read one of their articles I learn something new (for example I didn't realize you could exchange a stolen bike for sex). Approaching this as an economics problem seems like a good approach. I think if bike manufacturers built in ways to uniquely identify bikes, and those idents were economically infeasible to remove, then you could do a bitcoin style distributed database of the current 'real' owner of a bike, then the cops could periodically go into 7th and Market or where ever, collect all the stolen bikes and tell their owners they are recovered. If you remove 1/2 the bad dealers inventory every month its going to cut into their profits, and if they stop buying stolen bikes in bulk you make it harder to flip them etc etc.

Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#94

Post by pyoung » Tue, Aug 28, 2012, 7:35 PM UTC

derda wrote: post #62

I dont know if its common in the anywhere else but in my town here in germany the stealing of bike-PARTS has become very popular. I guess the owners of high-value bikes use better locks, that are actually hard to break ( like those: http://ebay.muskelkater-sport.de/fahrrad/schloesser/bordo-gr... ). But for Parts the risk is even lower and a good break or light system can yield a few bucks. I personally use a cheap (…

Yup, very popular here in SF. I recently just got my wheels stolen. Also had a few seats stolen as well. Stealing parts is probably more common than stealing entire bikes. And if you look at the pictures of the stolen bikes linked in the article, most of them are missing a front wheel, which to me, implies that the thieves were targeting bikes that were only locked by their front wheel (or they were selling the front wheels of the bikes, as those are pretty common theft targets as well).

Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#95

Post by mseebach » Tue, Aug 28, 2012, 7:35 PM UTC

furyg3 wrote: post #80

seanalltogether wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you charge someone with knowingly buying a stolen product in a legal system where someone can plead the 5th? How do you prove they knew? Typically legal systems don't go after end consumers of stolen or counterfeit products, they go after suppliers, because they can prove that suppliers are actively breaking the law.

Knowingly purchasing stolen goods is already illegal in most places. The key is the "knowingly" part. You would have to have a ubiquitous BikeID system in a central registry of stolen bikes. It would have to be incredibly easy to check the status of a BikeID (web/email/phone/sms). It would have to have incredible traction. At that point if someone bought a bike which was tagged in the system as stolen, and didn't che…

Actually, purchasing stolen goods is illegal in most places, full stop. The reason is that it's practically impossible to prove beyond a reasonable doubt what somebody did or didn't know, and when.

The BikeID idea is about as old as bike theft, but it's pretty difficult to enforce. If you care enough about not buying a stolen bike, the solution is simple: Ask for the original invoice. If not, you're not going to bother looking up the bike.

You could sweep parking areas, but you'd only return the bikes to their owners, at considerable cost to operate - and buying a stolen bike is still free of risk of punishment.

Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#96

Post by rkalvi » Tue, Aug 28, 2012, 7:36 PM UTC

I think there is a decent underground operation of used bikes: I recently bought a bike off a used car bike shop in mountain view ( off of shoreline ). You walked in and there were 500 bikes ( in all shapes and sizes ) available. From vintage to kids to racing. You name it. I always wondered where they got their bikes from. Most bike owners dont report, keep track of the bike ids. And police dont have incentives to track them. If the margins weren't there, people wont steal them.

Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#97

Post by ralfd » Tue, Aug 28, 2012, 7:37 PM UTC

pavel_lishin wrote: post #17

lallysingh wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not terribly hard to find out -- the bike generates its own power, and is run outside. A few bikes with GPS and call-home device (powered by the bike) would draw traces to their destinations pretty quickly.

A pair of low-res cameras - one pointing forward, and one pointing upward - would result in some fantastic shots as well. (Though there may be privacy and legal concerns.)

Speaking of cameras: I wonder if bike theft is lower in the UK because of widespread CCTV surveillance?

Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#98

Post by zurn » Tue, Aug 28, 2012, 7:37 PM UTC

colinshark wrote: post #61

Jun8 wrote: post #55

I think a useful tactic to curb loss of expensive bikes would be to legally target the people who buy them, these are the people that cause the market to exist and perpetuate the situation. My guess is that most of these people are not crooks, i.e. they are just young people who want to but can't afford a nice bike and they know exactly what they are buying. I don't understand anything about bikes so can't give an ex…

The difference between a nice "adult" bike and a cheap department store bike is night and day. The expensive bike won't rust. The expensive bike can be repaired when things break. The expensive bike is half the weight. If you are using your bike frequently, it's better in the long run to have decent hardware.

Sure, the department store bikes are garbage, but you can get a perfectly good brand name basic city bike for well under $1000.

Bikes mass is marginal compared to your body weight especially if you're average weight. A basic bike is 34 lbs and you are 175 lbs. And the weight only makes a big difference when climbing hills.

You're much better off losing a few pounds of fat than spending a few grand to get 10 lbs off the bike and shaving 2% off the required muscle power per mile :)

Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#99

Post by mindslight » Tue, Aug 28, 2012, 7:38 PM UTC

furyg3 wrote: post #80

seanalltogether wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you charge someone with knowingly buying a stolen product in a legal system where someone can plead the 5th? How do you prove they knew? Typically legal systems don't go after end consumers of stolen or counterfeit products, they go after suppliers, because they can prove that suppliers are actively breaking the law.

Knowingly purchasing stolen goods is already illegal in most places. The key is the "knowingly" part. You would have to have a ubiquitous BikeID system in a central registry of stolen bikes. It would have to be incredibly easy to check the status of a BikeID (web/email/phone/sms). It would have to have incredible traction. At that point if someone bought a bike which was tagged in the system as stolen, and didn't che…

Why would a purchaser, after paying, ever check a stolen registry? So they can add themselves to the list of victims as well?

Pre-transaction diligence is workable, post-transaction checks are a non-starter.

Re: What Happens to Stolen Bicycles?

#100

Post by simba-hiiipower » Tue, Aug 28, 2012, 7:39 PM UTC

elliottcarlson wrote: post #76

There is a bike seller in Manhattan who uses an interesting system in reselling his (more than likely) stolen bikes. Once a buyer contacts him via craigslist, he finds out the persons general vicinity, brings the bike to the area and locks it up with a combo lock based chain. He will give you the address of the bike, and if you like it, can make the purchase online and you receive the combination. If you don't want i…

interesting; i’d say that's pretty damn brilliant.

then again, if the risk of being caught (and punished) is as low in NY as it appears to be in SF, that seems like a bit of an overkill; wonder what the scale of his organization is..?