Contribution
I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, for taking up the cudgels on behalf of the noble Lord, Lord Jackson. I thought I had got away with it when I did not see him in the Chamber, but the noble Baroness turned up at the last minute, like the cavalry, and charged in to raise this very important issue, which I appreciate her doing. She is right to do so because, self-evidently, mobile phone theft is unacceptable. It is a significant criminal operation—as the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, said, it involves overseas criminal gangs—and a great inconvenience, cost and discomfort to many people. We need collectively to take action to support the reduction of mobile phone theft.
Amendment 366, moved by the noble Baroness on behalf of the noble Lord, Lord Jackson of Peterborough, would require technology companies which offer cloud-based services to use technical measures, such as cloud-based blocking, to prevent access to cloud-based services after a device by a registered user has been lost or stolen. The noble Lords, Lord Clement-Jones, Lord Hogan-Howe and Lord Blencathra—and the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Gower, from the Front Bench of His Majesty’s Opposition—expressed support for that principle and indicated that it is one method of tackling the scourge of mobile phone theft.
I share the noble Baroness’s concern about the theft of mobile phones and other devices that host cloud-based services. The number of thefts is too high and we are determined to get it down. I agree that urgent action is required to make sure that the companies which design these devices—to take up the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe—play their part and do absolutely everything they can to ensure that a stolen mobile phone is not a valuable commodity and therefore not worth stealing.
I share the intent to reduce mobile phone theft, but I suggest to the noble Baroness that there are a number of potential practical challenges in the proposed approach that I am uncertain whether we would currently be able to overcome. Many apps on mobile phone devices have some element of cloud access, so the range of companies in scope of the provision would appear to be extremely broad. In addition, disabling all cloud services could, for example, stop tracking and recovery of mobile phones, especially if the tracking function relies on cloud connectivity. That would impede law enforcement’s ability to identify locations to which stolen devices are taken.
As noble Lords will note, there is a measure in the Bill to ensure that tracking of mobile phones is dealt with in a much speedier and more effective way without the need for warrants. The Government are working with industry and law enforcement partners on the delivery of practical and effective measures. As the noble Baroness said, there was a very productive round table in February which brought together police, technology companies and others to look at how we can do what the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, recommended: break the business model of mobile phone theft.
The summit resulted in clear commitments from attendees, including data sharing on mobile phone theft to get a comprehensive picture. There was also a range of other measures, including the police stepping up their operational response. Members will have seen this particularly in London, where the Metropolitan Police—I also pay tribute to the City of London Police—has targeted high areas of that activity as an operational response to catching criminals responsible for these crimes. As I have mentioned, the Bill gives police powers to enter premises to search for and seize stolen items, which would be negated if the tracking element was not allowed. That will help in seriously tackling this issue by enabling the tracking down of stolen mobile phones to particular properties.
As a result of the summit, technology companies and policing partners have continued to work together and there have been a number of working groups looking collectively at tech, operational issues of street action by police forces and other issues, although the main committee has not been reconvened. We have had a change of Home Secretary since the summit took place, so I will go back to the Home Secretary’s office about the potential for reconvening the major group, because it is important that that is done and seen through.