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by otterley
1648 days ago
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Is this the rule or the exception? No doubt there are reported failures, but is that the average experience for a reporter (even accounting for race, gender, etc.) of a stalking or other similar personal security concern? Stories such as these are useful for motivating the public and our government to fix the problems, but they have a side effect of discouraging people from taking useful action where it would not be harmful. We should be giving our most helpful advice here; let’s not make people panic unnecessarily. The fact of the matter is that Apple will only provide the identities of AirTags owners to law enforcement officers in the course of legitimate investigation work; in the interest of privacy, they won’t give them out to just anyone who asks. So if you want to get help, getting LE assistance is practically the only way to go. |
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In Germany, it is estimated that 300.000 (!) stalking cases happen each year, not even 20.000 get reported to the police - and only 1 % of these (!!!) ends up in a conviction.
Unfortunately, as with all attempts at estimating why crimes are not reported, data is scarce - the general consensus seems to be a mistrust in police and the court system (either that the case gets ignored, that proof is insufficient or that personal data ends up at the offender - I personally was exposed by incompetent cops at court after filing a criminal complaint for racism against a local Nazi, fwiw), and a fear of attackers escalating their behavior.
[1]: https://www.zeit.de/news/2020-12/25/stalking-grosse-dunkelzi...