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Idea of the Day: A Twitter Account To Shame Bike Thieves

  1. Jenny Xie

The San Francisco police are taking their anti-bike-theft efforts to social media.

According to the San Francisco Police Department’s recent report on bike thefts, 864 bikes were recovered by the police in 2012, but only 142 were returned to their owners. Fed up with this sad statistic, Officer Matt Friedman took the fight against bike theft to Twitter. Friedman started up the account @SFPDBikeTheft at the end of July, and so far, he's made at least one bike owner very happy.

Friedman also keeps the account flowing with bike-locking techniques, photos of stolen bikes recovered by the police, and even photos of bike thieves. 

While there may be legal concerns with tweeting photos of alleged criminals, so far the account has proven popular among the public, with a following of 999 and counting.

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