'Phoney' techies and snatchers crack stolen phones

The narrow streets of Ritchie Street and the infamous Burma Bazaar, which mostly deals with sale of electronic goods that are either smuggled without paying duty or brought by small-time traders, have now found a new business model. 

There are groups of ‘techies’ who specialise in ‘cracking’ locked smartphones. Even high-end iPhones pose little challenge to these experts and like a small community of goldsmiths, who work hand-in-glove with thieves to purchase stolen gold, these techies have teamed up with the ever-growing population of cellphone snatchers. Once a phone is snatched in the city, in no time it lands up either at Burma Bazaar or at Ritchie Street where these experts unlock the smartphone, enabling the snatcher to sell it as a second-hand phone. 

Police are yet to crack down on this illegal nexus, despite being fully aware that snatched cellphones resurface in these areas. Thus far, the police are yet to take action against a single person involved in helping snatchers sell their loot. “We know it is happening and these ‘experts’ crack phones for as less as Rs 100 per phone. Some are even purchasing these phones from the snatchers,” a police intelligence source told  DT Next. 

Police have discovered that the snatched cellphones are disposed of in two different ways. “There are experts who crack smartphones and reset the device so that it can be sold as second-hand phone. Another way is to dismantle the phone and sell it for parts,” V Balakrishnan, Deputy Commissioner of police, 

Mylapore told DT Next.

 It is a big business as there are several cases of cellphone snatching reported in the city. The actual numbers are not available as most of these cases are not registered with police. Unless the case involves violence, where the victims are assaulted, police only provide a Charge Sheet Register (CSR) to the victim and do not register an FIR. Police sources said investigation into cellphone snatching does not happen. 

City crime records bureau sources told this newspaper that 62 cases of cellphone snatching were recorded from January to April in the city, 

which is a far cry from the actual numbers. 

“We only register FIRs in cases where violence was perpetrated on the victim. For all other cases, we only give CSRs,” a senior police official said. Meanwhile, the victims of cellphone snatching say that they have given up on the hope of tracking their phones as police are too irresponsive. 

“My brand-new phone worth Rs 12,000 was snatched right in front of the Police Commissioner Office in January and still I have not got it back. Police only gave me a CSR and refused to register an FIR. I made several enquiries and the reply I got was that they could not trace it,” J Kumar, who lost his mobile phone, said. 

Speaking to this newspaper, Additional Commissioner, South, K Shankar, said, “When we investigated these cases, what we found was that there are agents who roam around in areas like Burma Bazaar to purchase stolen phones and take them to north Indian states. They dismantle and sell the parts. We had once traced a bulk quantity of phones lost in Chennai to Rajasthan," He added that the mobile phone snatchers sell mobile phones to these men and not to the shops in Burma Bazaar or Ritchie Street.

Once the cellphones are snatched by robbers, they quickly land up at Burma Bazaar or Ritchie Street. 

A group of techies unlock the phones to sell in the secondary market. 

Even high-end smartphones such as iPhones are no match for their skills. 

Police, however, refute the claims and maintain that the stolen phones are taken to north India