Porch pirates have stolen $8 billion worth of packages in past year, report says

OHIO — Thieves may be waiting for any Cyber Monday packages that could start arriving today.

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Porch pirates have stolen about $8 billion worth of packages in the past year and 44 million Americans have had a package stolen in the last three months, according to research from Security.org.

News Center 7 consumer reporter Xavier Hershovitz reported on this story from Greene County during News Center 7′s Daybreak.

He says researchers found something people are not doing if they have a package stolen.

Less than one in seven package thefts are reported to the police, a spokesperson said.

A typical stolen package is worth $50, the report says.

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Hershovitz says this is an issue we have seen across the area in Montgomery, Miami, and Greene Counties.

“If they’re noticing a lot of reports from a certain neighborhood, they can reallocate resources to, you know, have more patrol in that area, less patrol in areas, that don’t deal with this type of crime as often,” said Corie Wagner, Security.org.

Hershovitz says 90% of adults are worried about their packages being stolen this time of year.

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There are some things people can do to make sure their packages are not stolen:

• Invest in a security camera
• Schedule shipments together
• Have them delivered to a secured space or where someone will be

Wagner says it also depends on what you are shipping.

“Maybe that’s something you don’t need to do for every single delivery,” she said. “But if you order something really special, or really valuable in that case, you might want to think ahead about where you’re having it delivered.”

She added this happens in both rural and urban areas.

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