The incidences of stolen car navigators being sold at internet auctions are continuing. Hence 3 internet auction companies (Yahoo, Rakuten and DNA) have decided to make it mandatory for users to enter the car navigator production code at the time of entering the navigator for auction.

The Police Department too have said that henceforth they will be providing production codes of stolen navigators to internet auction companies in order to stop further sale of the stolen goods.

According to information given by them, there were 3000 cases of stolen items having been sold through internet auctions in year 2008. Out of this, 1239 were the car navigators. As against just 34 cases in year 2004, there has been a great increase in these thefts recently.

The reasons for these thefts being increasing, are that even re-sale of car navigator attracts good money. Also, in internet auction, as production code of car navigator is not displayed, it is difficult to know if the item is a stolen item. Further investigation too becomes difficult.

Hence, in meeting conducted by the Police Department's experts (Meeting for overall security measures), the need of registering production codes by users (which currently is done by just 40% users) is stressed to car dealers and car navigators.

The Police also have asked internet auction companies to exclude from auctions, the car navigators with no production code registered or with false production code.

According to information given by Police, by August 2008, there have been 30 million registered users of internet auctions. There have been around 270 million items for sale in a year.

(News courtesy : Yomiuri, 25th March 2010:13.55)

Translated by: Ms. Pallavi Gokhale from Pune