Victim's clever move led cops to gang suspected of sending 40,000 stolen UK phones to China

Police say they have smashed an international organised crime gang suspected of exporting 40,000 stolen phones a year worth millions of pounds.

Two Afghan nationals were arrested last month on suspicion of running the network which is thought to sell up to 40% of all iPhones snatched in London. They are said to be trafficking the devices on an "industrial scale" to China where the latest model can be sold for £3,700.

Over the past week officers made a further 15 arrests on suspicion of theft, handling stolen goods and conspiracy to steal. Operation Echosteep began last December when a victim alerted police that her "Find My" app was showing her stolen device was in a depot near Heathrow.

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Officers swooped and recovered it among over 1,000 handsets that were on their way to Hong Kong. This led to detectives identifying two men in their 30s, codenamed "Seagull" and "Heron", who are suspected of heading the network. They have since been charged.

During covert operations the pair were allegedly seen in a Costco wholesale warehouse buying 1.3 miles of silver foil, used to wrap the phones to prevent them being traced. The Met has dedicated specialist guns and robbery teams to snare the suspects.

They intercepted further shipments and used forensics found on the packages to identify the two main suspects. Detectives carried out further enquiries over the following months as more packages were sent out of the country. More than 30 suspected devices were found during searches at 28 properties across London and Hertfordshire.

Commander Andrew Featherstone, Met’s lead for tackling phone theft, said on Monday: “This is the largest crackdown on mobile phone theft and robbery in the UK in the most extraordinary set of operations of this kind that the Met has ever undertaken. We are talking about some serious criminality here.

"A criminal can turn that phone into cash within a matter of hours or less than that for around the £300 pounds mark and then it's up to £1,000 a phone depending on where it is in the process. So it's very lucrative for those doing it at scale."

Police said the "local to global" business model involves thieves selling stolen phones to middlemen who pass them up the chain for export. One thief caught with 15 stolen handsets was estimated to have made £100,000 a year from the trade.

Mr Featherstone said Apple had the ability to make the handsets impossible to use anywhere in the world but has so far refused to do so. He said: "We have been challenging Apple to say once a phone is stolen that it shouldn't work ever again unless it was returned to the original customer. That's a challenge we are still having with them."

Det Insp Mark Gavin said: “Behind every one of those phones is a victim. People keep their lives on their phones, and it can be heartbreaking when they’re stolen. We heard from people who had lost photos of deceased relatives and others who were violently assaulted during robberies."

The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, said: "This is, without doubt, the largest operation of its kind in UK history, and it was humbling to see first-hand how the Met are going after the leaders of international smuggling gangs as well as the street robbers and snatchers fueling this industrial scale crime."

Crime and Policing Minister, Sarah Jones, said: “The unprecedented scale of this operation sends a clear message: if you're involved in phone theft, be it on the streets, behind shop counters, or part of an organised crime gang, we’re coming after you."

Apple said in a statement: "We have been working on this issue from a hardware, software, and customer support standpoint for more than the last decade.

"We have made and continue to make significant investments to create industry-leading tools and features that put control in the hands of our users in the event of theft. These features disrupt and discourage criminals from stealing phones in the hands of our users."