Police departments in the U.S. are increasingly relying upon text message tips to catch bad guys. Boston started doing this a year ago and has received 678 tips. These tips have helped take numerous bites out of various crimes, including vandalism and murder.
One thing that concerns me is the possible abuse of such a system. Say Popular Girl A doesn’t like Popular Girl B: why not send in an anonymous tip that she’s dealing marijuana, or something else just as sinister?
As an aside, the original story quotes a girl who typically sends upwards of 6,000 text messages per month. Are you kidding me? What a horrible existence.
Totally agree that they will get a ton of false positives for that exact reason. I guess they are willing to deal with 100 of those for every one that is legit if it bring people to justice.
One other point - the police would get even more tips by text message if people could send them in anonymously. There’s a free tool that let’s you do that, with no registration required:
http://www.mobilemammoth.com/send-text-message
It seems to be working just fine here in South Africa. We usually try to combat crime with every means possible as it is unfortunately out of control. Our security industry must be the most advanced in the world.
Here is the Website:
https://www.crimeline.co.za/default.asp