Skip to main content

Smartphone kill-switch tech could save consumers $2.5bn a year, research claims

smartphone kill switch california 2015 phone theft
Image used with permission by copyright holder

While gluing it to your hand may be one surefire way to prevent your mobile phone being stolen, surely the most effective anti-theft strategy would be to make the device as unattractive as possible to potential thieves.

By this we don’t mean putting a picture of Donald Trump on your home screen or smearing it in a foul-smelling substance. We’re talking about the kill switch – technology that allows a stolen phone to be rendered useless from a remote location by the phone’s owner or carrier.

Recommended Videos

Money saver?

If all handsets had the technology built in, the market for stolen phones would quickly evaporate, according to Creighton University statistics professor William Duckworth. And if that happened, US consumers could save themselves billions of dollars a year in replacing nabbed devices and spending out on pricey insurance policies.

In research published over the weekend, Duckworth estimates Americans spend around $500 million on replacing stolen handsets, and four times that on insurance when they purchase a new phone.

Duckworth’s study, which involved a sample of 1200 handset owners, found that 99 percent of respondents were in favor of kill-switch technology and that more than 50 percent would buy cheaper insurance that excluded theft if they felt that more confident their phone was of less interest to thieves.

‘Blocked by carriers’

San Francisco District Attorney George Gascon and New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman have long advocated the use of the anti-theft technology, but claim it’s being blocked by carriers intent on putting corporate profits before public safety.

When a carrier sells insurance to a new handset buyer – often through a company like Asurion – the carrier takes a cut of the sale. The top four carriers in the US reportedly raked in almost $8 billion through such sales in 2013.

Spare parts and hackers

Asurion’s Bettie Colombo said in a statement that while the company isn’t against the idea of incorporating kill switch technology into phones, “there is no solution that will totally eliminate the theft of smartphones as there are other values in the black market for the phones, such as parts.”

Legislation aimed at forcing the implementation of the technology in newly sold phones is currently making its way through Congress, while several states are also looking at the idea of introducing their own laws.

At the end of last year, major US carriers stopped Samsung from including a kill switch in its handsets, citing – of all things – security concerns. The carriers – AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, T-Mobile, and US Cellular – said the technology could allow hackers to infiltrate the system and maliciously disable devices.

Apple launched a similar security system with iOS 7 last year. Activation Lock is designed to prevent others using the phone in the event of theft or loss and includes a feature that lets the owner erase all of its personal data from a remote location.

While it’s not known if the feature has had any effect on lowering the iPhone’s attractiveness in the eyes of thieves, Creighton, Gascon, and others clearly believe laws forcing all phones to include kill switch technology would not only reduce theft, but also save consumers money.

[via Huffington Post] [Image: Cunaplus / Shutterstock]

Trevor Mogg
Contributing Editor
Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…
2025 could finally be the year of a budget-friendly Samsung Galaxy Z Flip
A person closing the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 6.

The idea of a more budget-friendly Samsung clamshell has gained steam as well-known leakers drop more and more hints that a new Galaxy Z Flip is on the way. Today, another leak from someone in the know adds even more credence to that rumor.

Ross Young made a post on X where he suggested that Samsung might release a Z Flip 7 FE in 2025 with the clamshell design fans have waited for. Young has a proven record for accurate leaks, and their work in the supply chain gives him a unique insight into what companies are working on.

Read more
Google just announced Android 16. Here’s everything new
The Android 16 logo on a smartphone, resting on a shelf.

No, that headline isn't a typo. A little over a month after Android 15 was released to the masses in October, Google has already announced Android 16 and begun rolling out its first developer beta of the newest Android version.

If this seems like a much earlier release than usual, that's because it is. We typically expect the first developer beta of the next Android update to arrive in February. For Android 16, however, Google has pushed the timeline up by a few months and launched Android 16 Developer Preview 1 in mid-November.
Why Android 16 is launching so much earlier

Read more
Here’s every Pixel phone that can download Android 16 Developer Preview 1
The Google Pixel 9 Pro XL next to the Google Pixel 8 Pro.

Even though Android 15 launched only recently, Google is already moving on to Android 16, which is much earlier than is typical. And if you have a Pixel device from the past couple of years, you can get the Android 16 Developer Preview 1 right now.

Typically, when Google releases a beta for Android, the Pixel lineup gets it first before any other phones. When Google announced Android 16 earlier today, we didn’t know exactly which Pixel models would be able to get the Developer Preview. But Google just revealed which models can run Android 16, and two of them are a bit surprising.

Read more