[antihero]

Just need a way to deal with bike theft. My number one concern is parking my pretty decent bike within view of where I’m sitting or not leaving it unattended for over five minutes. I’m insured, but I have a bond with my wheels!

If anyone has recommendations for stealth theft detection/tracking devices I’m all ears.

[solardev]

These are great, light u-lock style frame locks made of titanium: https://tigrlock.com/

Your wheels and components might still get stolen, but not much is really going to stop that. You can add a cable lock if you really want to but they're easy to cut through.

Bike registration (https://bikeindex.org/) might help in some circumstances.

But really, insurance is the thing that will cover you. Many renters'/homeowners' insurances will cover theft of bikes too, even when you're away from home, so you don't necessarily need supplemental bike insurance.

The thing about the trackers is that they're for after-the-fact recovery, not deterrent (especially if they're stealth). It's just going to get parted out, so if you're lucky you might recover the frame and not much else.

[throw0101a]

> Just need a way to deal with bike theft.

Vehicle registration works, but takes a bit of effort:

* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=el1Xznv5ge4

Vancouver had a 42% drop in theft after joining this program:

* https://project529.com/garage

Created by X-box co-founder:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J_Allard

[acomjean]

Someone broke into my building and stole a bunch of bikes from the bike room (people weren’t locking them up once inside). The few that were registered to park at the university (big silver stickers) were left alone.

Often I don’t think the bike theives check if the bike is “good”. My cousins bike was just over $150 new and was stolen. He had a cheap lock because he thought who would steal this.

I’ve been riding 10 years a moderately decent bike. No issues but I use a U lock which is decent.

Please lock through the frame. I’ve seen like 6 front wheels locked to bike racks with the rest of the bike gone..

[nomel]

We had hundreds and hundreds of bikes at my previous job. It was amazing. You could just hop on and go anywhere. Nearly all disappeared. As it turns out, the scruffy looking guy I saw, riding one bike and steering another with his free hand, wasn't collecting and returning them in the whee hours of the morning.

The new bikes had GPS attached, but they limited the numbers, due the theft. Those slowly disappeared, too. Last I saw, there were just a few bikes at each bike rack, compared to maybe 50 at each.

[isbvhodnvemrwvn]

Where I live the organized thieves (as opposed to the local drunks) disassemble the bike and get rid of the frame ASAP. Same with cars, they park them in large car parks with no monitoring to see if it had a tracker, after a couple weeks they drive it off to disassemble (with fake plates to avoid ANPR)

[jotm]

Yeah, my acquaintance does something similar, collects ebikes and scooters with a GPS jammer, takes all the parts and dumps the frame.

A big waste imo, though newer models have trackers inside the battery - smart considering it's quickly becoming the most valuable part.

[SketchySeaBeast]

A few years ago my wife had her registered bicycle stolen after I screwed up and left the garage open. We reported it stolen and only took 3 days for it to make its way back to us. It made its way back to us because the cops stopped someone for looking like they too nice of a bike, so that's a whole other problem, but registration works.

[vdqtp3]

> that's a whole other problem

Is it? Or were your cops right and doing their job?

[stonogo]

Impossible to tell from one event, coming from someone who has been pulled over because I "didn't look like" I could afford my car.

[mauvehaus]

In my experience it's mostly a matter of not having the most desirable bike or the shittiest lock. Put a $100 u-lock on a $300 bike, and you can almost be assured that you'll have neither. Put a nice enough lock on yours, and you can be pretty sure you won't have the most easily stolen bike either.

At least in the US, road bikes are pretty much immune to being stolen because they're seen as terminally uncool by the lay population. Would I leave a $5000 road bike locked up at a subway station? Not likely, but I'm not fast enough to justify owning one anyways. $2000, yeah probably, as long as I'm not leaving it there daily.

Anecdotally, police won't do shit to recover a stolen bike in the US. Having some kind of tracker is only going to help you once it's already been stolen. I'd focus my efforts on preventing the theft in the first place.

[microtonal]

In my experience it's mostly a matter of not having the most desirable bike or the shittiest lock.

Right, in The Netherlands, where there are a lot of bikes, this is the basic rule: just make sure that there are other bikes that are more attractive to steal, even if it's a new bike. The second basic rule is: use a chain lock to attach your bike frame to an unmovable object, so that a thief cannot just throw your bike in a van and remove the locks elsewhere.

What I do:

- Use a ring lock for the back wheel. Makes it unattractive to steal just the wheel. The lock needs to be unscrewed from the frame to remove the wheel.

- Use a chain lock and make it go through the frame, front wheel, and attach it to an unmovable object. In order to steal the frame, the thief would have to saw through the chain in plain sight.

- If there is no supervised parking, park the bike in an area where there are enough people where someone will notice a thief trying to break the locks.

- Get bike insurance. It's usually only 10 Euro per month and if your bike gets stolen, you get back the bike's value.

- Some insurers also install a tracker. This has double value: bikes with a tracker are less attractive to steal. Secondly, bikes with a tracker are usually moved to a 'cool-off' location first. This is usually just some place removed a few streets from where the bike was stolen. If it's still there after a few days, the thieves know that nobody is actively tracking the bike and they can take it somewhere to comfortably break the lock. So, it's likely that the insurer will find the bike at the cool-off location without much damage.

[merely-unlikely]

Unfortunately here in NYC the public won't bat an eye while your lock is cut off[1]

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGttmR2DTY8

[danenania]

I wouldn't want to confront a potentially aggressive person with a saw in hand either. I might call the police, but I'd assume that by the time they got there, the thief would be gone, and that's if the police even cared enough to send someone.

I think this is mainly an enforcement issue. The police could easily track these people down if they were willing to put any energy into it.

[happyopossum]

> The police could easily track these people down if they were willing to put any energy into it.

That's a bit of a myopic view - in many of these cities, the DA will refuse to prosecute someone for thefts like this, so it does no good to arrest someone. Police in many cities are underfunded and understaffed, and if they're getting no support from the DA they have to prioritize.

[danenania]

Fair enough. "Police" in my comment should be expanded to include prosecutors and even the mayor I suppose.

[jasonwatkinspdx]

This very much varies by location in the US. In the central areas of most major metros your bike WILL be stripped if locked up on the street and not attended/guarded. I live in one of the most bike friendly cities in the US, and I can't even lock up my bike outside of a bar/restaurant downtown without having to chase off aggro dudes trying to strip parts off it in the broad daylight. And I'm talking a dirt cheap commuter bike from bikesdirect.com. A $2k bike locked up downtown here would last 2 minutes. They use battery powered grinders, so how uber your lock is doesn't matter anymore either.

It's a really frustrating problem, and has changed the way I feel about this city a lot. Being able to just casually ride around with friends socializing in summer evenings was really great. Now it's everyone taking ubers.

[merely-unlikely]

My experience having recently had my road bike stolen would disagree. You're spot on about fancy bikes automatically being a target and the importance of your lock job being at a minimum more difficult to get through than the neighbor's. I now have a cheap single speed for my "around town" bike along with a heavy kryptonite ulock.

[nuclearwast]

This is something I never understood. Why so many bike theft? a regular new one is 3-4 hundred$ and cannot be sold that easily (Say vs electronic goods). Why theft is so popular?

I mean thief can steal one for their own purpose, but then what? He steal another one every weeks?

I dont get it.

[cogman10]

Steal the bike, sell it on craigslist/facebook marketplace/etc for $100, profit.

It can often take less that 5/10 minutes to steal a bike which is a pretty good RoR.

How could we stop it? Probably the best way would be stronger regulations on community marketplaces/pawn shops/ebay/etc. ATM, they don't GAF about selling stolen goods.

[wpietri]

I also think the police just don't take it very seriously. Certainly that's the case here in SF. I've reported a number of stolen bikes over the years and my impression was of massive indifference. After bike number 7 was stolen, I just gave up. A few years later I'm thinking about buying a bike again, and risk of theft is my number one concern.

[cogman10]

Well, not to defend the police, but after a bike is stolen I don't know what you could expect them to do.

Even if they had a dedicated bike recovery task force, the most they could do is visit local pawn shops and browse community marketplaces for a bike matching the description (assuming it wasn't broken down for parts).

Now, before a bike is stolen, I'd expect police to actually patrol places where bikes are being commonly stolen from (or for that matter, places where cars are commonly broken into). That part is something I do blame them for. The fact that SF is basically synonymous with "don't leave anything in the car" is an indictment on local police.

[wpietri]

I think it would be great if they actually policed not just the pawn shops and sketchier bike shops, but also the people randomly selling them on the street and the back-alley bicycle chop shops, which are easily visible. Instead of the theft victims wandering the neighborhood trying to find their bike and get it back, which is what happens a lot here, I would like the police to take a swing at it.

But from the air of the police taking reports, absolutely nothing will happen. One time a cop asked me why I was bothering, did I need it for insurance or something? No, I told him, it was a crime and I figured that being police, they'd want to know. That seemed novel to him.

But I don't just want them to do something for me after my bicycle is stolen. I'd like them to be energetic enough in running down organized bike theft operations that those criminals find some other line of work. And a good way way to do that is taking individual bike thefts seriously.

[gpm]

Here in Toronto I (and a bunch of other people) witnessed a bike being stolen in broad daylight on a major street downtown.

Naturally we took videos and called the cops. Naturally the cops didn't show up (the store manager we left the videos and pictures with said they did show up like 7 hours later). In the subsequent 10 minutes the thief came back and stole two more bikes, while we continued to watch and video (and not physically intervene, because fighting a guy with a power tool is a really stupid idea).

If the cops showed up promptly at the very least they could have prevented two bikes from being stolen. There's a good chance they would have managed to arrest the thief too.

[danenania]

It also seems like a good candidate for sting operations. Put expensive bikes out with flimsy locks in places with high rates of theft and have undercover officers watch them. When they're stolen, either arrest the thieves immediately or follow them for awhile to figure out who they're working for.

[playingalong]

There is a market for buying used Dutch city bikes elsewhere in Europe. I guess some of them are stolen goods.

[Bluecobra]

Having a dumpy old bike helps. I have accidentally locked my cheap u-lock to the bike itself instead of the bike rack a few times at a train station and nobody took it. The worst thing that has ever happened is that someone stole my quick release skewer, so I have a screw on one now.

[kuschku]

Honestly (at least from my experiences in Düsseldorf, Hamburg, Essen, and Kiel): As long as your bike isn’t super expensive (e.g., I’ve got this: https://boc24.de/products/bocas-bari-trapez) and you’ve locked it with a lock that’s resistant to bolt cutters (even something as simple as https://www.kaufland.de/product/313003426/), it’s not going to get stolen.

Even if you’ve locked it overnight for multiple days at the main train station (tested in Düsseldorf and Kiel), it’s going to be fine.

[ClumsyPilot]

About locks - nobody ever picks locks, only brute force is used.

If the lock is a cable lock, it's worthless. If the lock is solid metal over 5mm, it can only be cut by angle grinder. Once you are in angle grinder territory, whether it's 5mm or 15mm doesn't seem to matter. So i think there is no point spending over $100 on a lock.

Additionaly, you can use a hydrawlick jack to break d-locks, but that doesnt work on chains and is very dependant on how exactly you locked up

[yonaguska]

And smaller locks are trendy now because it's much harder to use an angle grinder on a tiny u-lock without sawing through something else.

[badlucklottery]

>If anyone has recommendations for stealth theft detection/tracking devices I’m all ears.

If you have a bike lock/chain that can resist bolt cutters, you're probably fine for everything other than leaving it overnight. Casual bike thieves are looking for easy money and likely aren't going to bust out an angle grinder in the middle of the day unless your bike is obviously worth a grand+.

[antihero]

Here in the UK thieves just use portable angle grinders that go through any lock like butter.

I have a hefty Abus “sold secure” (requirement of insurance) D lock that I lock through the frame, but I’ve watched enough lock picking lawyer to know this won’t stop thieves with angle grinders (most thieves now) or ones handy with a disc detainer pick.

[badlucklottery]

In the US (at least for now) the angle grinder crews are mostly limited to nights when they can steal a lot of bikes a once and chuck them into a truck/van (ex: bike racks near student housing in college towns).

But the exception is always high-value bikes. That's why I called out bikes that aren't "obviously worth a grand+". If you leave out a nice eBike or a superlight road bike, the thieves have solid financial motivation to risk breaking out the cordless grinder and making a ruckus to steal it. Hell, sometimes thieves would straight up wait for people to come back to their bikes after brunch or whatever and mug them for it after they unlocked it in Albuquerque. No tools needed other than a knife.

[happyopossum]

What kind of society allows someone to use an incredibly noisy and obvious tool like an angle grinder in public, then ride off on a bike? Does everyone just walk by because they're afraid to get involved?

[brewdad]

Yes. Are you willing to risk your life or serious injury over a stranger's property? Very few people are.

[gpm]

I've witnessed it, called the cops and took videos, but I'm not going to physically fight the guy with an angle grinder and little to lose - not even if it was my own bike. That was the same reaction everyone else around had.

[MrFantastic]

Cover the branding labels on your bike. The thieves want to steal expensive bikes, not a walmart bike.

I used white engineering reflective tape. They'd have to be very dedicated thief to notice to the Deore XT components.

Plus, the reflective tape is very visible at night.

[olyjohn]

Yeah... this is totally wrong, or maybe it depends on where you live... Here, cheap bikes get stolen all the time. I started riding my heavy-ass, ancient, steel, suspensionless bike that I had bought 20 years prior for like $200 from Target. Not even a pawn shop would want to take the bike, because they are cheap junk. It got stolen from me in less than a week after starting a biking commute. And yes I locked it up. The lock was cut right off.

The thing is people aren't stealing them to always sell them. Sometimes it's just easier to quickly grab a bike when the thief needs to get across town for some other reason. When they get to where they want to go, they just ditch the bike. Sometimes I think some people just want to steal a bike for no real reason.

In Seattle, I've seen gigantic piles with hundred of bikes in them just sitting in a homeless camp. They clearly aren't selling those bikes, as they've been sitting out in the rain for months, or even years now. And I guarantee those homeless camps aren't full of multi-thousand dollar bikes.

[InCityDreams]

Amazon do bike alarms. $16? Kind of intended for motorbikes(?) but when i turn then both on - one wedged under the seat and another less permanently attached - the conversations generated guarantee me onlookers (bar/ cafe) almost look after the bike for me. Decent lock, too. Drop the chain off and whack it out of gear (it hurts if you forget). If im inside and i see someone checking out thd bike i 'test' the alarm.

[ClumsyPilot]

there are quite a few trackers, but I don't know how much they help you in recovering the bike

https://pimpmybikeretail.co.uk/product/sherlock-bike-tracker...

[markvdb]

Getting a good quality folding bicycle (Brompton!) may be even easier. Just take it inside with you.

[aaaaaaaaaaab]

Easy. Vote for politicians who promise punishing bike theft with multi-year prison sentences.

The reasoning is simple: bike thieves disproportionately contribute to climate change by discouraging large-scale bike use. This must be punished.

[ClumsyPilot]

> Vote for politicians who promise punishing bike theft with multi-year prison sentences

Please don't - this is typical 'tough on crime' trick: promise long sentences, so easy - longer sentence-less crime, right? Wrong. Sentenses are useless if no-one ever gets caught. Look at countries with the toughest sentenses in the world, and you will find they have loads of crime

You actually have to use your brain, and think and plan, on how to make sure criminals are caught. You have to take real action like training investigators, installing trackers, registering property, etc.

For example in UK concervatives have been in power for 12 years, punishment got much harsher but crime is growing because they have cut police numbers, and you chance of getting caught is ~0%. The longer people get away with crime, the better they become at crime. Now we have a large 'talent pool' of highly trained thieves.

[The-Bus]

(I think the poster was being facetious)

[amadeuspagel]

> Please don't - this is typical 'tough on crime' trick: promise long sentences, so easy - longer sentence-less crime, right? Wrong. Sentenses are useless if no-one ever gets caught. Look at countries with the toughest sentenses in the world, and you will find they have loads of crime

Perhaps the causality goes the other way here? Perhaps suffering under loads of crime makes people vote for tough sentences?

[bluecalm]

Idk, it seems theft is low in countries where they cut hands for it.

Bike theft is a very harmful crime. It stops the move to healthier lifestyle, it leaves people, often poor ones who don't have cars without means of transportation and it cause many to not commute by bike.

I want aggressive policing, including trap bikes set up by the police to fish out potential thieves and lock them for years once caught, alternatively make them wear GPS locator all the time. I want them to feel fear every time they think about stealing. Maybe empty "tough on crime" promise isn't enough but it's surely better than typical approach of "let's all think about those poor thieves" or victim blaming (just lock your bike with 2 U-locks and keep your eyes on it all the time if you don't want it stolen).

[ClumsyPilot]

> Bike theft is a very harmful crime.

Yes it is, but I disagree that turning bike theft into a 20-year sentence is going to help.

> Idk, it seems theft is low in countries where they cut hands for it.

Russia has 99% conviction rate, long sentences and torture in prisons, yet crime rate is sky high. US has more prisoner and tougher sentenses than UK, but UK has less crime

Half the people here are engineers, think like one, about systemic solutions and not revenge. Crime is a business, it only happens because its profitable.

You could setup a city-wide LoRaWAN bike tracking network for $100,000, you could hand out $20 trackers to every cyclist and weld them to the frame, from the inside if you have to. You could produce airtags-compatiable trackers, register every bike and check them periodically, etc.

You could install safe cycle storage throughout the city, that is alarmed and has cameras and calls the police when it detects sound of angle grinder.

Thousands of different solutions are possible.

[bluecalm]

You're repeating the old trope that tough punishment doesn't work. Look at the theft statistics though:

https://www.theglobaleconomy.com/rankings/theft/

Neither USA nor UK have tough punishment for theft. Theft is different than violent crime as that is most often caused by emotions/rage/etc. While theft is more calculated. It makes sense there is little consideration to punishment when committing the former but more when engaging in the latter.

Some people want to steal. Bikes are currently one of the easiest targets but if you make those difficult to steal they will move to another attractive thing like catalytic converters or purses until you lock everything. Aggressive policing and punishment wasn't tried yet in Western countries when it comes to theft. That would involve setting traps for thieves and taking the crime seriously instead of making naive calculation about the value of stolen items and ignoring long term cost and damage to social structure.

[ClumsyPilot]

> Aggressive policing and punishment wasn't tried yet in Western countries when it comes to theft.

What is the basis for your certainty? We've done research on the subject, we know that certainty of punishment is a lot more effective than severity.

Noone thinks 'ow yeah, I am gonna do a year in jail', everyone thinks they will get away. I am not against setting decoy bikes that are actually traps, but thievs will learn to tell them apart. US police uses sting operations against hookers and drug dealers all the time, and there is no shortage of either.

https://www.sentencingproject.org/publications/deterrence-in...

> ignoring long term cost and damage to social structure

You could try that, but you cant just have a special calculation for one crime. Then we must equally apply it to corporate misbehaviour, like illegally selling customer data or manipulating the market.

[kyleee]

yeah some good old sting operations would be great to see

[philwelch]

Has anyone ever called you a “radical centrist”?