Stopping cable theft

So-called ‘cable crime’ is reaching astronomic levels; to help prevent and detect such crime, security specialists Tag Guard have introduced CableTag – a wireless CCTV system specifically designed for this application

This release and picture can be downloaded from www.nextstepmarketing.co.uk/press

Energy, rail, telecom and mining industries have all become highly vulnerable to a copper crime wave fuelled by the soaring price of all scrap metals which has seen copper prices alone more than triple since 2004. British Transport Police say incidents of cable thefts from railways have seen a dramatic 20-fold increase in the last 3 years with the cost of replacing the stolen cable estimated at £4 million last year, whilst the electricity industry put the figure at £3 million. To combat this rising tide of 'cable crime’, security specialists Tag Guard have introduced CableTag, a dedicated version of TagCam, their established wireless CCTV product.

For locations like mining quarries or railway engineering works it is not always practical to install permanent CCTV or cost-effective to have 24-hour manned guarding. But these are the very same locations where cable is stored (or simply left lying around) while work is in progress, making them highly vulnerable to theft.

Richard Lang, Managing Director of Tag Guard Ltd, comments, “We introduced the new CableTag in response to the significant increase in enquiries from organisations up and down the country that have now experienced theft of copper cable and other metal-based raw materials from criminals that want to cash in on their high scrap value.

“CableTag functions in exactly the same way as conventional CCTV but without the need for cabling. In most cases it can be integrated with our wireless TagAlarm system to further enhance the deterrent and detection effect.

“Being wireless, the system is much quicker, easier and simpler to install; no phone lines are required and it can be redeployed in any new location giving major reductions in overall security costs.

“Apart from the known deterrent effect of CCTV, we can back the installation up with our 24-hour central monitoring service which means we can react instantly to any incident, alerting on-site security, mobile patrols or the police”.