Proxy marking is a term used in Britain. It’s a strategy for marking property for the purposes of tracing it back to the rightful owner if it’s ever lost or stolen. The most common form of this strategy is the way number plates on motor vehicles are tied...
Guest blog by Thomas Raulen, law enforcement professional.* Many colleges and universities are wrestling with the level at which their campuses will be occupied by students this fall. Some schools are choosing a fully online approach to higher learning, at least for...
Guest blog by Thomas Raulen, law enforcement professional.* Picture this. You get home after being out of town for a week. As you enter your front door, something does not feel right. Before you have a chance to process the strange sensation, you notice items out of...
MyPropertyID works worldwide and ships worldwide. It’s interesting that in the age of the internet, it’s difficult for some people to fathom this. One of the most fundamental and early developments of the internet, beginning in the 1990s, is what makes our...
Many of you will remember from your history lessons that when the Ford Motor Company first developed the production line, Henry Ford repeatedly increased the wages of his employees, while also dropping the prices of his cars. How did we get from that caring business...
The Code to a Broken Lock is a modern-day parable that is captured in the Facebook post below. Lost and stolen property is recovered routinely by Good Samaritans who desperately want to see it reunited with its rightful owner. Now, there is a simple internet-based...
Guest blog by Thomas Raulen, law enforcement professional.* There is no shortage of ways in which one can become a crime victim. From online scams to credit card fraud to identity theft, offenders can perpetrate their crimes without even being in the same state or...
Guest blog by Thomas Raulen, law enforcement professional.* One of the reasons intelligence-led policing has enjoyed success in its crime-prevention mission is due in no small part to its multifaceted approach. With efforts focusing on both potential victims and known...
Tracing motor vehicles is completely different than tracking them. The same is true of cellular devices. You trace cell phones with International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI) number, and you track them using the “track my phone” feature. Tracking...
What are the core crime-prevention strategies of law enforcement agencies? In 1973, there was a landmark study titled, “The Kansas City Preventive Patrol Experiment.” The experiment examined public perceptions and actual crime levels as it relates to the...
Guest blog by Thomas Raulen, law enforcement professional.* Law enforcement officials and the public they serve tend to agree that crime prevention and criminal apprehension are among the top mandates for police agencies. In furtherance of at least one of those...
Guest blog by Thomas Raulen, law enforcement professional.* When you hear the term, security system, what comes to mind? For many, it is what used to simply be called a burglar alarm. Through the use of door and window sensors or motion detection, unauthorized entry...
All crime-prevention strategies are 3-way partnerships between law-abiding citizens, law enforcement professionals and some sort of intermediary. Whether it’s 9-1-1, neighborhood associations, Neighborhood Watch, Operation Identification or National Night Out,...
FAR 52.245-1(f)(v)(B), Subcontractor Plans and Systems, requires that there be adequate controls of government-purchased equipment for even the tiniest subcontractors. The problem is that there is very little technology available that offers any kind of traceability....
There is a missing link in home and small business security systems when it comes to property crimes. Video doorbells, alarm systems and security cameras are great deterrents against violent crimes, and an important tool for the police, but these technologies rarely...
2 CFR Part 200.313(d)(3) is a Federal regulation. CFR stands for the Code of Federal Regulations which is contained in the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Uniform Guidance manual. It is nicknamed the Green Book and contains the rules for Federal grants. For the...
The DCMA stands for the Defense Contract Management Agency. The DCMA is very particular about how government furnished property (GFP) with serial numbers is tagged, labeled or marked as being under the control of a particular contractor or subcontractor. Think of a...
Any printing company that prints a random organization’s name, and a series of numbers, on an asset tag is not a competitor of MyPropertyID. …not even close!!! We’ve left those companies in the dust Let’s say you had a piece of sheet metal the...
If your asset tag number isn’t part of a state-of-the-art, uniform equipment marking system (UEMS), consisting of a globally unique identification number (UIN), tied to a uniform identification system (UIS), you are out of compliance with FAR 52.245-1(f...
Fidelity means faithfulness to original intent. In other words, what is the ideal way to implement Operation ID so it hews as closely as possible to its original, highly researched, design? What are the standards to which Operation ID should be held to? What criteria...
A U.I.N. is a unique identification number. Examples of UINs are driver’s license numbers, Social Security numbers and motor vehicle license plate numbers. In many foreign countries, each person is assigned an identity number. A new kind of UIN At MyPropertyID,...
Even though Operation ID is still promoted worldwide by law enforcement professionals, the technology has not advanced in decades. Developing a simple and convenient strategy where all the citizens of the world can license their personal property, like they do a motor...
Very often, burglary, theft and robbery are used interchangeably by the public. It’s very important that citizens understand that each crime is very different and each comes with different responses from law enforcement professionals and prosecutors. “Put...
“What Can I Do to Improve My Neighborhood?” is the title given to a letter to the editor published recently in the Des Moines Register, my local newspaper. Letter writing is still a valuable way to communicate with neighbors, as the example below...
There are many things in life that we should do that we don’t do. Most of these things affect only ourselves and maybe our immediate family. But there are other things in life that don’t just affect us. As a result, local, state and federal governments get...
The federal government doesn’t mandate that trained and certified asset managers tag and title a trillion dollars worth of its property for kicks and giggles. That’s because, among other reasons, it’s a proven crime-prevention strategy consisting of...
All nations and states have standards for linking vehicle identification numbers to license plate numbers. There are very few examples as old, tested and robust as this strategy. When it comes to this strategy for government furnished property (GFP), FAR...
A unique item identifier (UII) is not the same as a unique identification number (UIN). When the UII is the serial number of an item such as a vehicle identification number (VIN) on a car, then the UIN is the license plate on the back. When the UII and the UIN are...
This is a memo from 1979 sent to the United States Attorney General, Griffin B. Bell from the Director of the United States General Accounting Office, Allen R. Voss, titled, “Department of Justice should explore the feasibility of a uniform identification system...
A licence plate on a motor vehicle is what is known as a unique identification number (UIN). But, if it’s so important to have a UIN on a car, why is it you only need a screwdriver to remove it? The reason is the technology you never see. The technology is in...
