Do bike registration/marking schemes reduce theft?

Belgium has a scheme where you can register all your bikes, they give you a sticker to put on them and apparently that reduces the chance of them being stolen (here in FR if you want https://mybike.belgium.be/fr).  The sticker is very difficult but not impossible to remove of course.  Does anyone have any idea if these schemes actually do anything?  My guess is yes but only slightly, in the same way that two locks help as it makes the theft a little more difficult so will likely direct thieves towards a different bike instead rather than being improved protection on its own.

My other problem is that you have then have an online registry saying you have a garage full of expensive bikes.  If that registry ever got hacked you would be a bit stuffed really.

Anyone use a scheme like this or read anything on its efficacy?

Might help retrieving them and storing their serial numbers but not the actual theft – for that i have my bikes in an Asgard shed and my house is very secluded. I never leave them out of sight on a cafe stop either.

I’ve often looked at these and wondered a similar thing.

Also: how many police forces actually use these schemes? If I hide a microchip in my seattube or something, as many of them like to do, will it actually get scanned if it’s recovered? Maybe only if there’s also a sticker on the frame to let them know…

Anyway, my thoughts are that on a decent bike it may help with recovery but not with theft. On something lower value like a ratty pub bike / commuter / kids bike etc that’s locked up at a public bike rack, then it’ll probably have some deterrent value (assuming the thief notices it).

As for registering it on the site, put very basic info at first just to get the number saved and then fill out the full details only after it’s stolen. That way you’re safe from the hacked database scenario.

Also: how many police forces actually use these schemes?

The police here apparently do, they promote this service as well.  They are even starting to use bait bikes to catch people but the whole ‘entrapment’ thing means it’s quite difficult to do.  Bike theft seems to now be a major blockage to getting people out of cars and onto bikes so it is being looked at.

It’s going to stop the North Face Ninjas with their angle grinders who will happily cut a lock in broad daylight in front of countless onlookers, but as others have said it makes returning them to their rightful owner easier should they ever be recovered.

How long before the database gets hacked and a list of everyone’s bikes appears on Google docs?

Actually reduce theft?

I highly doubt it, the goal is to help with later retrieval isn’t it not actual theft prevention.

Do you believe scrotes are taking a quick look under the BB for extra markings, or spotting some schemes sticker on the seat tube and just putting the bolt cutters away?

Plus Reg schemes, at best, only really make the frame truly identifiable, strip all the parts off and they’re easily sold on without any expectation of traceability.

citizenleeFree Member
It’s going to stop the North Face Ninjas with their angle grinders who will happily cut a lock in broad daylight in front of countless onlookers, but as others have said it makes returning them to their rightful owner easier should they ever be recovered.

Missed a key word: *not going to stop

Do you believe scrotes are taking a quick look under the BB for extra markings, or spotting some schemes sticker on the seat tube and just putting the bolt cutters away?

Absolutely not, but will it make them move on to the next bike – possibly.  The stickers are meant to be placed somewhere super visible, which is also what I dislike as I like my bikes the way they are but might be willing to trade off against increased security on some of them.

It used to be the local ‘Crime prevention officer‘ had a kit and would stamp/etch your postcode on the BB shell on request.

Now you just pay someone with a website to record your name/address and the frame number of your bike on a (probably not very integrated) database and send you a sticker?

Essentially both measures are the same waste of time and/or money, being seen to do doing “something” but not addressing the issue, which is that people have (increasingly) high value, portable assets and fundamentally have to rely on the good will of strangers to identify and recover them once stolen.

Bike theft is ideal for organised crime, its still a low priority for policing, but with increasingly expensive items which are difficult to positively identify post theft, the risk/reward balance has crept more and more in their favour over the last 30 odd years compared with lots of other types of crime.

Hard to defeat, multiple locks are a more worthwhile investment TBH, if you want to actually deter the thieves, the more effort required to get at your bike the more their risk/reward calculation changes.

The occasional local news piece where someone finds a lockup full of stolen bikes just illustrates the point. That’s about the extent of “detection” for every “Haul of 100 bikes” found, I bet there’s another 1000 that either leave the country, quietly change hands in a pub carpark 200 miles away, or get stripped for their parts to go up on eBay.

How long before the database gets hacked and a list of everyone’s bikes appears on Google docs?

Buy and apply the sticker, but only register if and when the bike gets stolen.

Now you just pay someone with a website to record your name/address and the frame number of your bike on a (probably not very integrated) database and send you a sticker?

Immobilize.com is free to use. You can buy stickers which have an additional unique security number on them but it’s not compulsory as the frame number is the first option. Not just limited to bikes either,  you can put anything of value on there.

I think the polices poor record best be demonstrated by when they do catch someone, raid the house and put the pics up. Theres usually over 50 bikes.

Embezzle 6000 and you’ll likely go to jail. But steal someones £6K ebike and its probably a fine and unpaid work.

The police actively encourage these schemes but…

…when my two bikes were reported stolen with two sightings of them being ridden down a street full of CCTV cameras at very specific locations and times I was told they weren’t even going to pull the CCTV footage ‘as ‘there just bikes and probably long gone by now’.

Basically their approach was ‘here is the crime number for the insurance, now sod off’