A startling 1.7 million packages are stolen or go missing every day in the United States, according to the New York Times. A lot of these disappearing deliveries can be blamed on porch pirates, the criminals who steal your boxes, bags and envelopes from your front door.
While home cameras have caught lots of footage of these illegal acts in progress, these cameras don’t stop these thieves for the most part. To show what you are up against during these Holidays, we’ve compiled 5 videos that show the lengths these stoop stealers will go to to take what doesn’t belong to them.
#1: Case the Joint
Think stoop surfers just happen to walk by your house, see a package and decide to steal it? Think again. These crooks are on the hunt for stuff to grab. The guy in this video cased the joint like he was on a diamond heist. Check it out:
#2: Follow the Delivery Truck
How do these robbers know when and where their next score is coming from? Easy, they follow mail trucks! Watch this guy -- he didn’t even wait for it to leave to make his move.
#3: Recruit the Kids
With so many packages being stolen and videos of porch pirates hitting the nightly news, thieves have had to get a bit clever. So instead of stealing stuff themselves, some send their kids to do their dirty work. Check out this lawbreaker:
#4 Steal the Camera
One reason there are so many videos of porch pirates is because people have security cameras installed to ward them off. But clearly this doesn’t stop most of them. Check out this crook--he not only took the package, he took the camera, too!
#5: Getaway Fast
For thieves, the getaway is just as important as the theft. This homeowner was lucky to survive when chasing after a car full of bandits who stole his parcels.
People are Fighting Back
With crooks going to such extensive lengths to steal stuff from front doors, people have decided to try some pretty major and involved tactics to thwart them. Here are a few ways:
- Building a box that goes boom.
- Fill fake packages with doggy waste to give perpetrators a “stinky surprise.”
- Catch them in the act.
- Placing a GPS tracker in dummy packages.
- Get a lockbox like DeliverySafe to be sure packages are always safe.
As much as we’ve been entertained seeing crooks get caught and surprised, we think getting a DeliverySafe is a much safer and easier way to go for the long-term. As package deliveries are a new normal in most Americans’ lives, it is best to invest in protecting them.