Cops in San Francisco using Twitter to find stolen bikes

Last week we explained why people kept stealing your bike, and how there’s nothing you can really do about it. Especially around here, police have so much to do, what with all the teens playing the knockout game, they’re not going to run after some bike thief. But out in San Francisco, police are leveraging the power of their local tech overlords to try to make a dent in bike theft, using a dedicated Twitter account to share people’s pictures of stolen bikes in the hopes of tracking them down.

Outside magazine shares the story of the San Francisco Police Department’s @sfpdbiketheft Twitter account. It works by having people tweet pictures of their recently stolen bikes to the account, which then allows the police to compare them to bikes found on suspicious or arrested persons. It’s at least been successful enough to get a pedicab back for its owner. Which, really, who steals a pedicab?

Somehow we doubt the NYPD is going to follow suit anytime soon, if not because of their contentious relationship with bike and pedestrian advocates, then because in de Blasio’s New York, criminals are going to be the ones dictating public safety policy.

Leave a Reply

Click here to cancel reply.

Name (required)

Email (will not be published) (required)

Website

Notify me of followup comments via e-mail