I’m speechless. TL;DR some guy stole 1 truck of 360’s totaling 1,500,000 US$ and then later another truck was stolen, with another 490,000 US$ of videogame related objects, mainly 360’s.
That’s, according to my math, like 4,000-6,500 consoles. 4,000 if all of them are premium, 6,500 if all of them are core; meaning the range is between there.
…how does one hide consoles in the thousands without being seen or found out?
Bring them to Japan, they’ll blend in easily.
Another question is what does one do with them. Anyone know if MS has all the serial numbers of the stolen items? Maybe that’ll make it so the thieves can be retraced. Although from the sound of it, a heist this big could’ve been done by someone who anticipated these kinds of difficulties.
Well I would assume that he would sell them.
How could they be traced? Unless Microsoft plants some kind of device in it so they can be remotely monitored (hint hint illegal), it’d be impossible. Unless you mean that once they go online, they could find the location of where they are (also illegal). I guess it’s not illegal if it’s used to catch thieves, right?
If MS has a list of all serial numbers and they see who logs on, there’s nothing illegal about it. Out of the couple thousand 360s stolen, I’d imagine, all it’d take is 1 to start an investigation. You find out where that person got his 360 and work your way down the chain.
Well, of course they can view who uses what 360 according to the serial given WITH the 360; but if no one goes online with said 360’s (unlikely, although chance) what then?
That is a possibility, you’re right. What then, I don’t know. That’s where old fashioned police work kicks in and its not as easy as it could’ve been.
It can’t be too hard to find 5,000 360’s, right? The only thing I can think of is that they must have hid it in a warehouse somewhere. But then again, it could be kept in a basement, although incredibly unlikely. It must have been a group effort.
It isn’t necessarily finding them that’s the problem, depending on who stole them and who they sold it to it’s more often getting them back. It isn’t all that unusual that the police in certain countries drive around in stolen cars and be very well aware of it, and they’re not exactly likely to just admit it and give them back.
But yes, Microsoft ought to at least be able to stop the stolen consoles from logging onto XBox Live.
Its a mafia hit…the mafia hijacks truckloads of product all the time, and then resells through their network. They know what they’re doing, its not like it was just “some guy”. There is probably a huge network already set up to distribute the stolen 360s.
I’m sure MS can track the 360s via their content IDs over live or something, but at that point, the product has already been sold to the consumer and they’ve suceeded in making their money.
Dev beat me to it.
And after the thief’s made his money, the most probable thing to happen is that the owners of these stolen X’s will get a message when they try logging into Xbox Live, along the lines of “the product you purchased is not legit. Call (some number) or browse through (some URL) in order to learn how to go legit”. Think of something like Windows Genuine Advantage Kit, except that you’d pay the value of your X360 in order for it to run properly instead of buying a OS license. Maybe the console will stop working until you pay too.
What if they bought it for 400 or whatever it is (unknowingly) from the person who stole it? They have to pay another 400 to keep their system?
The law has no pity for people that purchase stolen merchandise, no matter what it is. So you are right to point out that they will be screwed.
Even if they did not know? For all they know an EB Games employee could’ve stolen them and sold them at full price.
Even if you bought stolen property ina legal manner, it’s still stolen property. Technically, in most parts of America at least, you can be charged with possession of stolen goods even if you didn’t know they were stolen (most court systems, however, choose not to charge and try people for this, sicne it’s too much work and time for too small a charge.). However, what msot of this coems down to is: if you bought something legally, but said item wasn’t the seller’s item to sell legally, then it isn;t yours legally, and you need to return it to the rightful owner.
So everyday people buy products from stores, and there’s the small small small risk of it being stolen, and they get tried?
No, for the most part, the contraband is taken, and returned to the rightful owner. No charges needto be brought up. There are a numebr of other circumstances that might factor in, but I can;t be sure about them. I’m just going by what I recall of New York State law. The main part of which is, “oftentimes it’s better to exercise discretion in these cases.”
Well, specifically in the case of these Xbox’es: if you buy them from trustworthy sources (the stores where they are supposed to be sold), you have practically nothing to worry about. I’m placing my bets on these consoles being sold informally. In such a manner, anyone buying them is already aware of the risks involved in the purchase.
It would take a large amount of naivete, like that of a child who is still learning about the value of money and how to count change, to trust in a such a trade. You get a shiny, new videogame system for probably a lot less than what it’s worth, and with no legal documents as proof of the trade. And still I can picture the following:
-This is [fictional company] tech support, [insert name here] on the line. How may I help you?
-I bought this [insert fictional system here] the other day. The screen is always in black & white and it always overheats to the point of a system crash after 20 minutes on.
-Alright sir, what is the product’s support identification number?
-The what?
-It’s a number written in a tag affixed to the box in which the system was sold, sir.
-My system didn’t come in a box.
-Which store sold you the system?
-Well…
-Sir?
-… hangs up
Well, if, take my previous example, an EB Games employee stole the truckloads to sell in his or her store to skyrocket their store profits, it’s still thievery, even though EB Games is technically trustworthy.
edit; even then, Ren, the 360’s come in boxes when they’re manufactured; they aren’t put in boxes in store. So if an individual stole them, and sold them; they might have been sold in their original box anyways.