Monday, June 5, 2017

Stolen GPS Trackers Lead To Clueless Thieves

Note to Silicon Valley criminals: it's not so smart to break into the offices of a startup developing GPS tracking devices, and try to haul off with those devices. According to the Santa Clara Police Department, it has arrested a number of suspects, and recovered a storage unit full of stolen items, after those suspects apparently broke into the offices of Santa Clara-based IoT tracking startup Roambee. According to the Santa Clara PD, the suspects pried open the door to a business on the 3100 block of Del La Cruz Boulevard and stole approximately $18,000 in computer equipment, including approximately 100 GPS tracking devices. Roambee said it activated the devices, and provided mobile tracking apps to detectives, who were able to not only recover those stolen trackers, but stolen property from other victims--including a treasured WWII photo album from Saratoga. The Santa Clara Police Department said it arrested a suspect in Alameda on parole for weapons charges, as well as another male and female subject arrested with drug paraphernalia, a controlled substance, brass knuckles, a set of keys belonging to vehicle that did not belong to the suspect's, along with two of the stolen GPS trackers. Roambee provides its GPS trackers for asset tracking to companies, and is backed by Deutsche Telekom.