A smartphone kill switch, technology that remotely makes a stolen smartphone useless, could save American consumers up to $2.6 billion per year, according to a new report.
The report, by William Duckworth, an associate professor of statistics, data science and analytics at Creighton University, found most of the savings for consumers would come from reduced insurance premiums.
Duckworth estimated that Americans currently spend around $580 million replacing stolen phones each year and $4.8 billion paying for handset insurance.
Law enforcement officials and politicians are pressuring cellular carriers to make such technology standard on all phones shipped in the US in response to the increasing number of smartphone thefts.
They believe the so-called “kill switch” would reduce the number of thefts if stolen phones were routinely locked so they became useless.
But carriers have resisted these requests and there are now bills proposed at the US Senate, US House of Representatives and California State Senate that would approve such a system.
In light of the new findings, the argument in favour of kill-switch technology claims that if it in fact leads to a sharp reduction in theft of phones-something supporters argue would happen because stolen phones would lose their resale value if useless-most of the $580 million spent on replacing stolen phones would be saved.
A further $2 billion in savings could be realised by switching to cheaper insurance plans that don’t cover theft. Not all consumers would make the switch, but Duckworth said his research suggests at least half would.
As part of the report, Duckworth contracted a survey of 1,200 smartphone users in February 2014 by ResearchNow.
It found 99 percent of consumers thought cellular carriers should allow all consumers to disable a phone if stolen, 83 percent thought a kill switch would reduce smartphone theft, and 93 percent believed they should not be asked to pay extra money for the ability to disable a stolen phone.
According to data from law enforcement agencies, half of all robberies in San Francisco in 2013 targeted a smartphone. In New York it was 20 percent, a rise of 40 percent on 2012, and in London around 10,000 smartphones are stolen each month.