Calling on All For-Sale Sites: Require Serial Numbers!

Wouldn’t it be harder to thieves to fence stuff online if all reputable for-sale sites required sellers to post the serial numbers of their wares?

It’s been a pretty hectic week for Technograph, involving a couple of stolen Macbook Pros. The unibody was recently stolen, while its 2007 counterpart was found.

In the latter case, the robbed owner encountered a for-sale item on a local user group forum, and upon looking at the serial number of the item, realized that someone was trying to sell his stolen laptop!

To be clear, the poster on the forum wasn’t directly involved with the theft. Reports indicate that he bought the stolen laptop from someone else through another website. In fact, he innocently complied with the forum’s rule that for-sale posts should list the serial numbers of all items offered.

That’s exactly my point: for-sale sites should require that sellers list the serial numbers of their items. Victims of theft presumably watch out for the serial numbers of their lost goods, making reunions that much easier. Sure, sellers trying to fence stuff may post a fake serial number. But using a bogus serial is likely to make any buyer suspicious, once they inspect the item and find out that the actual serial doesn’t match the advertised one.

Obviously, for this recommendation to work, we all need to be vigilant. For-sale websites can do their part, requiring sellers to post serial numbers along with their items, while buyers can check the serial numbers of whatever item they’re getting to see if it’s stolen or not. Or even look for items only on websites that require serial numbers in their listings.

It’s impossible to eliminate theft and fencing outright, but we can make it as hard as possible. Why should we take the time and help other people recover their stolen goods? Because it’s the right thing to do, and if you end up as a victim of theft, wouldn’t consider the help of others valuable?