Vellore police return missing phones to owners

Vellore police return 150 phones worth ₹32 lakh to owners using new cell tracker application.

The district police in Vellore handed 150 mobile phones to the owners here on Tuesday.

The Superintendent of Police (SP), N. Manivannan, returned the phones worth ₹32 lakh that were recovered by the Vellore district cyber crime police, to the owners.

Tuesday’s initiative comes after the formation of a dedicated Cyber Crime police unit and introduction of cell tracker application at the SP office in Vellore. The new cell tracker application has a WhatsApp number (9486214166) through which people can complain about their missing and stolen phones.

As per norms, such missing phones are traced and returned to owners once in six months. “Using the cell tracker, we found 672 lost phones that are worth ₹1.24 crore so far. Most of the complainants are travellers,” said Mr. Manivannan.

 A five-member team comprising an inspector, sub-inspector and constables of the District Cyber Crime police unit traced the phones for which complaints were filed in all 28 Law & Order police stations in the district. The cyber crime team has been monitoring the missing handsets through their IMEI number at periodical intervals. Lost phones were tracked using IMEI numbers and cell tracker.

Police said that whenever the missing phones were activated, either by those who found them on the road or those who bought second-hand mobile phones from shops without proper verification, the cyber crime police team would alert the users that the phones they were using were stolen property. The users either hand them over to the police or send them through courier from other districts and other States. Using cyber crime cells, all complaints of snatching or missing mobiles phones were taken up for investigation.