62,000 phones and PDAs left in London cabs
By
Sylvie Barak
17 September 2008 03:26PM
Tags:
62 | 000 | phones | pdas | left | london | cabs
During the past six months, dozy Londoners have left a whopping 55,843 mobile phones and 6,193 other handheld devices in the back of black cabs, according to a report.
Credant Technologies, which carried out the survey amongst London’s licensed cabbies, reckons the levels of carelessness demonstrated by the City’s yuppies begs for better tech security measures to be taken, either through encrypting devices or, at the very least, password protecting them.
Pointing out that many of today’s smartphones and MIDs can store up to 10,000 Word documents, 11,000 pictures, 500,000 contact details or 1.1 million emails, Credant notes they are an easy target for identity thieves.
But not to worry: if you leave your mobile, laptop, iPod or USB stick in a London cab, you have an 80 per cent chance of getting back, according to the report.
This makes London cabbies a whole lot more honest than their New York counterparts, where the chances of retrieving a lost device are a measly 66 per cent.
And it's not just mobiles that get left behind either. Credant reports that sawn off shotguns, toilet seats, dead pheasants and even funeral ashes are also all items which have lately been left abandoned in London’s cabs.
The report goes on to say that one cabby found false teeth, artificial limbs, condoms and bras on his back seat -- hopefully not all from the same fare.
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