Three men have been arrested for phone theft in south London as police target criminals aiming to access banking apps on stolen devices after filming people entering their passcodes.
Metropolitan Police officers noticed one of the suspects filming over the shoulder of a man as he accessed his phone just before 3am on Saturday.
Officers had earlier identified the group of three men "whose behaviour and interest in passers-by was suspicious".
Officers were then able to stay close to the victim, and when the robbery took place they chased and arrested the three suspects.
The stolen phone was recovered.
All three men were taken into police custody and have been bailed pending further police enquiries, the Met said on Sunday.
Police are warning the public that as well as looking to steal phones, criminals increasingly want to access banking or cryptocurrency apps on stolen devices.
"They carefully observe or covertly film people accessing and using their phones before robbing them in order to obtain the necessary passcodes," the Met said.
"They often target people on a night out who may be more easily distracted and less aware of what’s going on around them."
A police operation is ongoing at locations in south London which have not been specified by the Met.
Officers are observing thieves as they observe potential victims, the force said.
A mobile phone is reported stolen in London every six minutes, shocking official figures revealed in April.
In August Mayor Sadiq Khan and Met Police commissioner Sir Mark Rowley called on the mobile phone industry to help them reduce phone thefts in the capital as startling statistics showed the scale of the issue.
Thirty-eight per cent of all personal robberies last year – equating to more than 9,500 offences - involved a phone being stolen.
Nearly 70 per cent of all thefts in London last year related to mobile phones.
