How Amazon and the Cops Set Up an Elaborate Sting Operation That Accomplished Nothing (vice.com) 129
New documents obtained by Motherboard using a Freedom of Information request show how Amazon, Ring, a GPS tracking company, and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service collaborated on a package sting operation with the Aurora, Colorado Police Department in December. From the report: The operation involved equipping fake Amazon packages with GPS trackers, and surveilling doorsteps with Ring doorbell cameras in an effort to catch someone stealing a package on tape. The documents show the design and implementation of a highly elaborate public relations stunt, which was designed both to endear Amazon and Ring with local law enforcement, and to make local residents fear the place they live. The parties were disappointed when the operation didn't result in any arrests. The Aurora Police Department received 25 Amazon boxes, Amazon-branded tape, and Amazon lithium ion stickers as a part of the operation. It also received 15 Ring doorbell cameras and 15 GL300W GPS trackers from 7P Solutions. "Operation Grinch Grab," as it was called internally, involved seven Aurora zip codes. These companies spent days with the Aurora Police Department preparing them for the operation, and discussing local news coverage and rewriting press releases.
Regardless of motive (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Regardless of motive (Score:5, Funny)
Agreed. I've seen a lot of brazen Amazonians stealing porches all over America.
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Re:Regardless of motive (Score:4)
Also, "number of arrests" is a poor measure of success.
The goal should be to deter theft, rather than to catch thieves.
So a better measure is how many packages were reported stolen.
By combining this operation with new releases and PR, Amazon was correctly focusing on deterrence.
Re:Regardless of motive (Score:5, Insightful)
Nothing they did was a deterrent. It's was a test to see how often in happens; which, surprise surprise, isn't that bad at all. People are confusing facebook and twitter post for actual data.
So arrests for this test is the best measure.
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Or you prove that thieves generally now what a camera staring right at you in the form of a door bell looks like. Ring devices are pretty well known, and for any thief, understanding the simplest ways of avoidance is the best way to not get caught.
Walk up to a door, see a Ring doorbell, knock on the door... excuse yourself as "got the wrong place". See the distinctive look of the Ring flood light at the corner of the house, just walk away. Mark the house as untenable, and you won't waste time looking the ne
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I don't understand why people are willing to pay for a high tech doorbell that only helps them after they become a victim of theft, instead of just buying a simple lockable delivery box. Bolted to the ground, package goes in and the delivery guy locks it behind them. Been around for years, and they are pretty cheap.
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Yes, they are scumbag, but the penalty is fine.
The real takeaway is that it's pretty rare and not some rampant thing you uncle on facebook makes it seem.
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"I'd like to see a lot more of these stings all around the countries. Porch pirates are real scumbags and the penalty for stealing items off people's porches should be a lot higher than it is."
But wait, I thought the takeaway from the Vice article was supposed to be how cops are evil and the corporations! or something?!
Re:Regardless of motive (Score:5, Interesting)
I thought the takeaway from the Vice article was supposed to be how cops are evil and the corporations!
The point the article was making is that a massive corporation and the police use each other to create some sort of narrative that might not match reality, but does benefit both the corporation and the police.
Otherwise known as propaganda.
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If you were living a state with real propaganda, you would not even know the actual result of the operation.
Thanks for completely failing to understand what propaganda is.
Propaganda is information that is not objective and is used primarily to influence an audience and further an agenda, often by presenting facts selectively to encourage a particular synthesis or perception, or using loaded language to produce an emotional rather than a rational response to the information that is presented.
Here's a link to the Wikipedia piece on propaganda. [wikipedia.org] You will notice that keeping stuff secret is not particularly useful to the propagandist.
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Why do you assume Amazon was paid for this "sting" operation?
Or, are you arguing that local police using bait boxes to deter/catch "porch pirates" somehow only benefits Amazon?
Re:wealth transfer project (Score:5, Insightful)
Amazon benefits from the fear cause by the false perception. Because Amazon is coincidentally selling the solution.
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Because Amazon is coincidentally selling the solution.
The solution to what, the problem you claim is inconsequential? And the solution that obviously doesn't work because it didn't catch anyone? Why yes, what a wily plan Amazon came up with ... very smart guys in the A marketing department. "Come buy our stuff to solve a non-existent problem that doesn't solve the problem anyway! Half off and free delivery!"
Re: wealth transfer project (Score:2)
The solution to what, the problem you claim is inconsequential?
Did he say that?? Fuck off.
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Yes, he said that.
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The solution to what, the problem you claim is inconsequential? And the solution that obviously doesn't work because it didn't catch anyone?
The solution they're selling isn't the sting operation. The sting operation was supposed to be the advertisement, to convince people that the rate of package stealing is high.
The solution is Amazon's program to deliver packages inside your house and inside your car, to avoid said thieves they want to convince you are a huge problem.
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The solution they're selling isn't the sting operation.
D'oh. Who said it was?
The solution is Amazon's program to deliver packages inside your house and inside your car,
Actually, the main advertisement is for Ring doorbells, but the inside delivery is also available.
In any case, a sting operation intended to catch people stealing packages that didn't catch any people stealing packages isn't a very good advertisement for the need for any service to prevent criminals from stealing your packages, now is it?
isiit time for citizens to take care of it? (Score:1)
Amazon and the police failed, yet a single individual can do better, with far fewer resources: Package Thief vs. Glitter Bomb Trap [youtube.com]
Re:isiit time for citizens to take care of it? (Score:5, Insightful)
The Citizens are out for revenge not justice.
While the Glitter Bomb Trap was mostly just a light hearted way to be annoying. Other citizens would be far more malicious with such traps. Such as making the package to hurt the individual.
I know if someone stole a package from me costing me a few hundred dollars, I would like to see the person suffer for stealing my property. And I wouldn't mind seeing them hurt for it. But that me getting revenge on someone who wronged me, it isn't justice. because causing physical harm to a person where I don't get the full picture on why they stole from me isn't necessarily just. While that $150 Amazon order would be slightly annoying to me, to the thief it may mean they can sell it and buy food for them for a few days.
This is why the legal system is suppose to have impartial judges. As the victim I have been hurt, and my response is max pain to show them how wrong it is for them to have wronged me. But Justice is about finding the correct punishment for the crime. Not just making the victim happy.
Re:isiit time for citizens to take care of it? (Score:4)
But on the other hand, crimes get committed when the perception spreads that a given modus operandi is easy to get away with. It would be most desirable if the police could effective nab porch pirates, but if for whatever reason they don't in your town, then it's perfectly natural that people will respond with booby-trapped packages. As soon as word spreads that someone got hurt, the piracy stops because the theft now bears a cost.
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...booby-trapped packages. As soon as word spreads that someone got hurt, the piracy stops because the theft now bears a cost.
Which is exactly why property crimes must be policed: people will take the law into their own hands, someone will get hurt, and then that injured person or his friends or family may retaliate.
Trapping Amazon boxes seems like mostly a way to hurt an innocent person and/or end up in prison yourself though.
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They stole from you because they have a disease, called drug addiction.
It might not have been their fault that they got the disease. Often they're too young to have culpability, or they were stupid enough to trust their doctor, something they've been trained by society to do.
I don't want revenge. I just want permanent quarantine.
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Oh shut up. There are many reasons.
" I just want permanent quarantine."
so revenge then?
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You probably didn't think of this, but we might have been born in communities and have just as much right to them as you.
Most of our neighbors might even agree on these issues.
Who are you to decide on behalf of another person's community, eh?
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If you can promise they won't be let out unless they're somehow cured, I'd even say just give them free drugs and good food in their quarantine. Video games, movies. Co-ed if you're using permanent birth control. Private rooms. Unlimited video visitation.
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Well said.
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Correction: the glitter bomb trap was a faked video with a bunch of people in on the joke, all intended to make a viral video that would get lots of media coverage.
Ah well, it was light-hearted so we can just excuse it. And he's sorry!
https://www.usatoday.com/story... [usatoday.com]
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Yeah, I have actual porch pirates. Lost a few boxes over the years. Most of them worthless to the thieves (very hard or impossible to fence), but often times up-ended my plans because I don't have the parts I need. Lost a shipment of PCBs one time. Absolutely worthless to anybody but me (and my client), but took me 6 weeks to have them remade and tested. I'm sure whatever asshole took them just tossed them. If they'd at least return the stuff they couldn't fence, I maybe wouldn't wish for them all to
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Here in the Netherlands, parcel delivery companies normally don't leave parcels unattended. If no one answers the door, they try again later, give it to your neighbor, or ask you to pick it up from a (hopefully nearby) parcel pickup point. In principle, the sender (who has a contract with the shipper) is on the hook for packages that get lost before they are handed over to the recipient.
I'm surprised that it works differently in America.
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Here in the Netherlands, parcel delivery companies normally don't leave parcels unattended. If no one answers the door, they try again later, give it to your neighbor, or ask you to pick it up from a (hopefully nearby) parcel pickup point. In principle, the sender (who has a contract with the shipper) is on the hook for packages that get lost before they are handed over to the recipient.
I'm surprised that it works differently in America.
It works differently because of mathematics.
The cost of replacing the fraction of a percent of items that are stolen/lost/damaged is less than the cost of the extra effort required to properly deliver the items.
It would have been so much better... (Score:5, Insightful)
It would have been so much better if the local police had been able to lure and arrest some kids stealing packages from porches, or maybe if they caught some local adults engaging in idle theft you'd be happier with the results?
That no one tried to steal the packages is good, that the word is out that police are starting to use "bait-boxes" to catch porch pirates going forward will only serve to help deter the theft of future packages on resident's porches.
Exactly what is the downside of this exercise? The goal is to deter future porch pirates, and while a few arrests can be quite convincing, credible reports of bait boxes are also a decent deterrent.
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The downside is that the writer is pro-theft so anti-crime stings are bad. See the line "and to make local residents fear the place they live". How does that make sense unless you believe the residents are criminals, and why bring it up unless you also like criminals?
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I think they may mean "make local residents fear the place they live" in the sense that Amazon wants the word to get out to more people that porch piracy exists, so that they can make those people fear their neighborhoods/neighbors/unknown more, and then sell them more Ring-branded surveillance. They were disappointed to have caught none since catching some would have increased the fear effect.
We live in a culture of fear. Amazon is now in the business of assuaging fear. So where there is not fear, they
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Nextdoor (the neighborhood based social network, if you haven't heard of it) is full of paid posts about Ring doorbells and the incredible number of stolen packages. No doubt this is a real phenomenon but the posts are designed not to just inform you of that but to strike fear. People coming to your very door to steal! And the only way to stop them is to buy one of our doorbells.... Like stealing a package is just one tiny step away from breaking in and killing everyone inside.
Sure, stealing packages fro
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The funny thing is that the Ring doorbells don't seem to deter anybody. All the videos I've seen show people walk up to the porch, grab the package(s), and walk off. Some are brazen enough to look right at the doorbell. Doesn't seem like crime is being deterred in any way.
Honestly, what's going to happen to the thief anyhow? The police around here can't be bothered to look into vehicle theft. They certainly aren't going to be combing the streets looking for that stolen thumb drive you ordered. I guess
Re:It would have been so much better... (Score:4, Insightful)
It's vice.com . It's not going to make sense. The "and to make local residents fear the place they live" line is nothing more than victim blaming. Please let the thugs and criminals run amok and steal your stuff. If you don't like it, if you report it to the police, etc. you're racist!!!
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It's vice.com . It's not going to make sense. The "and to make local residents fear the place they live" line is nothing more than victim blaming. Please let the thugs and criminals run amok and steal your stuff. If you don't like it, if you report it to the police, etc. you're racist!!!
You really don't get it, do you? You've totally bought into the narrative that the world is filled with criminals and thugs and if you don't place yourself and your stuff under constant surveillance, then you'll be in a world of hurt. Seriously, you've bought into it so completely that for someone to even question the need for such a thing they are a "victim blamer" (puke), or, as another poster put it, "pro-crime."
Since this is /., let me make a really simple analogy for you....
Data shows that red-light
Re:It would have been so much better... (Score:5, Interesting)
" the writer is pro-theft "
wow. SO.. stupid.
It's bad cause the police are teaming up with corporation to set traps for criminals.
It's bad because police dollars was wasted to appease Amazon for some trinkets.
It's bad because amazon is using the police as shills for Amazon's solution to this tiny non problem that's been exasperated by people sharing the same few stories and people assuming because they here is 10 times, it's really bad. Completely ignore that those 10 appearance on there Facebook page were all the same one.
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>It's bad cause the police are teaming up with corporation to set traps for criminals.
Why is that bad? There's an ongoing problem with package thieves in many places in the US. Catching would-be package thieves sounds like potentially a good use of police resources considering that it could prevent further strings of crimes. Maybe there'd be a problem if they were trying to entice people into committing crimes they wouldn't normally commit (that's entrapment), but that's not what they were doing; they we
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I think it is unethical for a company to be using police and police resources to try to drum up business. The police doing this is totally reasonable... Amazon approaching the police in the hopes of using the results of a sponsored sting to sell more doorbells is a lot more sketchy.
I don't actually have problems with the police setting up stings to catch people stealing packages, but it seems likely to me that in this case, they were doing this in an area that didn't actually have a problem... Either that
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It's bad cause the police are teaming up with corporation to set traps for criminals.
Spoken like someone who is pro-theft or at least an apologist for criminality. They might be traps but this isn't "entrapment" by any stretch. Nobody is inducing anyone to take property that isn't theirs here. In fact that lack of induction resulted in guess what no criminal behavior to bust! Anyone who does happen to snatch a bait box is someone who would but for their bad luck have snatched someones stuff! Why exactly don't I want them off the streets or otherwise punished such they they will think t
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This attitude really needs to die. Failure is a necessary part of progress. Finding something that works usually involves first trying out dozens, if not hundreds of other things which don't work. If you make it politically untenable for anyone to fail, then you halt technological and economic progress dead in its tracks.
You can ding people for having a low success rate (low ratio of successes to failures, although there's
Re: It would have been so much better... (Score:2)
So... your solution is to allow the thefts to continue without any effort to catch the criminals? Since it's a small percentage of the total deliveries and it's almost never your stuff, everything is cool, right?
Moving beyond sarcasm, why shouldn't a corporation work with the police to address a problem for it's customers?
If you're pro-criminal I could see why you take issue, but thievery is not a legitimate career choice.
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the writer is pro-theft
PROTP: Read your posts back to yourself before hitting submit. If they are this batshit insane maybe reconsider.
Re:It would have been so much better... (Score:4, Insightful)
Plus, the characterization that the program was intended to scare people about the place they live is just crap. People are already aware of thieves who steal from porches. It's a good thing when police make a visible effort to deal with that problem.
None of those are downsides (Score:3)
- Cost
So you are saying police should do NOTHING about catching porch pirates? Anything they do would cost something, only here the cost to the police was much lower because Amazon was giving them equipment.
Eventual automation of things like automatically submitting video from those cameras to "cloud providers" for facial analysis.
Why is this bad it is exactly what everyone who installs a door camera desires.
Close relationship between private, for profit companies and Police. Why need a warant.
Why is this
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I's barley an issue, s it's waste of police time.
And what do you expect the police to do? sit on your porch? monitor your home 24/7? Mostly, the police are a response unit.
"Why is this bad it is exactly what everyone who installs a door camera desires."
That's false.
Just because you don't seem to know this, the camera's aren't criminal detectors. they take picture of everyone.
"Why is this bad, having companies that suffer form thieves (Amazon pays to replace a lot of lost packages) work in cooptation to help
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"I's barley an issue, s it's waste of police time."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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"idle theft" lol
"I was just sitting there and the package fell out of a tree and landed in my backpack! Honest"
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The only thing missing from that highly likely and believable story is a beautifully animated and scored scene from the next "Incredibles" movie.
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Exactly what is the downside of this exercise? The goal is to deter future porch pirates...
Actually, no, the goal is not to defer porch pirates. The goal is to sell a bunch more Ring doorbell cameras.
AFAICT, the goal of Amazon and its partners is to make sure that folks never leave their homes, that all goods and services and delivered to you "conveniently," that that you're too damn scared to interact with reality in any way that isn't heavily mediated.
The line in the original post:
...designed both to endear Amazon and Ring with local law enforcement, and to make local residents fear the place they live.
is a bit of an editorialization, but it's true.
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Though it isn't stated outright, the involvement of Ring makes me think that the goal was to get confirmed video of someone stealing a package via a Ring camera, that could later be used in Ring advertisements. Ring has been forced to take down some of their recent ads because they starred individuals who were not confirmed to be criminals or confirmed to be engaged in criminal acts.
Speaking for myself, I would prefer for there to be a bold line between law enforcement and corporate marketing.
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The downside is that it reveals the perverse attitude of American law enforcement. Any cop who is "sad that we won't be able to showcase an arrest" needs to be suspended with pay and retrained immediately on what the job of the police actually is.
As Sir Robert Peel said, "the test of police efficiency is the absence of crime and disorder, and not the visible evidence of police action in dealing with them."
Forget porches... (Score:1)
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Package theft at apartment complexes are a lot higher since a neigbhor can grab the Amazon package while walking through the hallway. My apartment complex paid $25,000 for Amazon to install the Hub [youtube.com] to secure package deliveries.
My old apartment complex just held all packages in the leasing office for residents to pick up. A lot cheaper than $25k, and worked for more than Amazon packages.
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Package theft at apartment complexes are a lot higher since a neigbhor can grab the Amazon package while walking through the hallway. My apartment complex paid $25,000 for Amazon to install the Hub [youtube.com] to secure package deliveries.
My old apartment complex just held all packages in the leasing office for residents to pick up. A lot cheaper than $25k, and worked for more than Amazon packages.
It's only cheaper if you ignore the cost of labor -- the labor cost of having someone sign-in, track and sign-out packages is can be significant in any sizeable complex. You might say "But they don't track anything, they just put all of the packages in a room and we just go in and pick them up", but then they are facing some liability if any packages are missing/stolen.
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yes, a clipboard is so complex and difficult.
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From TFA (Score:3)
Amazon requested Aurora Police Department members to come to their office to pick up Amazon-branded packages, tape, and stickers
What?! The cops dropped off the packages? That's not going to fool the porch pirates. They follow the USPS, FedEx and UPS trucks around. And any attempt to carefully place a package in the Ring field of view (instead of the usual 'dump and run') is going to raise suspicion.
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No, those thefts also happen with people trolling.
These are people who will follow a truck around in hopes for getting 100 bucks worth of stuff, so not exactly smart.
Um, ok (Score:2)
So, they didn't catch anybody ... and ... ?
That means porch theft doesn't exist? Something else?
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It means the sample size was so small that they weren't likely to make any difference at all in the world. The sample size was also too small to measure the actual size of the problem, so there was no risk that they would accidentally make people feel secure. The whole thing was just designed to be a news blurb and never intended to make anyone safer.
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It means it's massively over rated by Amazon to scare people into buying an Amazon solution.
Too much publicity? (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe, if the police department and Amazon hadn't generated so much local buzz, beforehand, that they were going to be doing a sting, they might have caught someone
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Well it might’ve been problematic that the packages also had a large label stating “BEFORE STEALING, PLEASE REMOVE ANY HAT AND LOOK UP”.
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Hype (Score:2)
So packet-thieves are about as numerous as illegal voters.
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precisely.
Glitter Bomb Package Thieves! (Score:1)
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LOL (Score:3)
This would have been better done in Centennial (middle class), Cherry Creek (very rich but gated), lone tree (very rich, some gating), Castle Pines (upper class) or even Castle Rock (middle to lower class, so maybe no).
WTF? (Score:2)
and to make local residents fear the place they live.
Really? God I wish you fuckers would stop trying to think for me. It is disgusting. You can not alter my world view with this shit. STOP.
Entrapment (Score:2)
Sounds like an entrapment scheme.
Basic police work (Score:1)
Sounds like they didn't do their homework. Wanna catch a porch pirate? Fish where porch pirates practice their trade. Seems they didn't do that or the bait wasn't good enough.
Wonder what would happen if they had a box from Apple that said - Apple Iphone XIV. The ultimate Iphone! (Pre release) Send it to a San Francisco address. They'd probably have pirates coming out of the wood work for that sucker.
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you're busy accusing Russia and Iran, or North Korea, or whoever it is this week, of trying to steal your freedom.
That's because in Russia, Amazon packages steal you -- and they're okay with that.