LPRC - CrimeScience – The Weekly Review – Episode 157 with Dr. Read Hayes, Tom Meehan & Tony D’Onofrio

Episode Date: August 3, 2023

On this week’s episode of CrimeScience, Dr. Hayes discusses new initiatives in Portland and with our SaferPlaces Lab both locally and with our partners, and our co-hosts discuss violence in retail and trends for this week, as well as media and social media updates with domestic companies working with Meta and Facebook. Listen in to stay updated on hot topics in the industry and more! The post CrimeScience – The Weekly Review – Episode 157 with Dr. Read Hayes, Tom Meehan & Tony D’Onofrio appeared first on Loss Prevention Research Council.

Hi, everyone, and welcome to Crime Science. In this podcast, we explore the science of crime and the practical application of this science for loss prevention and asset protection practitioners as well as other professionals. Welcome, everybody, to another episode of Crime Science, the podcast. This is the latest in our weekly update series, and I'm joined by co-hosts Tom Meehan and Tony D'Onofrio, our producers, Wilson Gavirino and Diego Rodriguez. And we're going to take a quick look at some of the things that are going on in the world of crime and loss prevention. And this week, we've got some visitors in our labs. We've got access communications to do some brainstorming and installation.

We've got Follett Bookstores and Solink. So we're excited about all the visitors, the opportunity to work with them to brainstorm and to look at what's important. There's a lot of linkages. That's what Solink's here for. And a lot of brainstorming around how do these retailers do more with less and also deal with the ever changing landscape. And we've talked about some what's going on there. We're now two to three of us are now getting ready and making preparations to go to Portland, Oregon with a major retailer and potentially other retailers may meet up there as well as some leaders. So we're doing some real deep dives there, looking at crime mapping and what we can do

to understand the dynamics of what's going on to the best that anybody possibly could anyway in Portland, Oregon, but how what's going on is driving crime loss, but a lot of fear of crime and a lot of people leaving the community. So stay tuned for more of that. We've also are doing some heavy duty planning for some upcoming Safer Places Lab initiatives. Now, last week, I'm excited to report that the Safer Places Lab Port St. Lucie initiative launched. And so in that case, we're looking at three Walmarts located in Port St. Lucie, Florida. And then we've got the Port St. Lucie Police Department and their chief, Del Toro, and his command staff, as well as his crime analysis team, that we're working together to understand just what's going on in the three parking lots, particularly at their Walmarts there in that community.

What types of crimes and other issues are they dealing with, disorder and so forth? Who are the offenders? Where are they coming from? How far are they traveling? How are they linked? How much of this is leading to crime victim St. Lucie PD, and other things that they know to be going on will be recorded and mapped. The same, though, by Walmart, right? So in this case, Walmart, everything that they are aware of that's going on, particularly in their parking lot, but also their store and their losses and so on, all that's going to be recorded and mapped and get an idea of what's going on that one party knows about, not the other. We've talked a little bit about this in the past. That's a major objective of the LPRC, and that is to understand what crime and disorder is happening and who knows what and what do we not know. So by combining both radar screens,

if you will, we want to see where the overlaps are and where those gaps are. So the other part of this is being able to measure the types of events have been going on for 18 months in the three parking lots. One parking lot last Wednesday got treated, if you will. We put in three mobile protective units from LVT or Live View Technologies. These are outfitted to look almost exactly like, at least from the marking standpoint and coloring, a Port St. Lucie police vehicle. We tried to strategically position the three mobile protective units in that parking lot to gain maximum visibility for people that might be driving or otherwise moving up and down the road in front of them and then us one and as well as the entry exit points there are two major entry exit points and then of course once you're in that lot and a lot is massive

so we want to maximize visibility uh and impact to comfort the green shopper the actor that we want there as well as obviously deter and disrupt the red so stay tuned on that we'll be measuring to see what what kind of behavioral changes might we see in that parking lot after implementing the treatment or the intervention uh compared to before and compared to the two other locations that were not similarly treated with mobile protective units. So, two objectives, what's the impact of the treatment? And then finally, what are we missing? What do we need to know as far as having mutual understanding about what's going on, situational understanding and awareness? So, another thing I want to report is yesterday, we launched the Safer Places Lab

Eastside Initiative. Eight retail chains participating in that one. And so, what we're doing now is much more complex than what we're learning and doing in Port St. Lucie. But we're working on the concept of connect, affect, and also detect. And so these concepts, as mentioned before, are very important. Detect or detection of an offender or a crew before, during, or after a crime is going to be, is paramount for reducing crime

and crime attempts. And so in this case, online scraper tools to understand what's going on before, what kind of threats or communication or coordination, acquisition, movement, and so on that's going on before an event, anything that might be happening during the event, and of course, post-strike at that point at bank. We talk about left at and right at bank, where they might be selling items and so on. So we want to understand that in Zone 5 online. We want to understand in Zone 5 by sensors and intel from our neighbors and from our partners in law enforcement. So this is that opportunity to work on those concepts. We call strategic share as well as part of the connect

part, but detect is paramount as well as now detection is an individual or vehicle or a crew enter the parking area zone four as they approach and enter the store zone three and move through that location. And then the opposite as they leave, move through the store, through the parking area and go back into zone five to another place or to come back to that place or to go fence or whatever they're going to do. So you can see where detect or detection is paramount as well as effect. That's the part where we're working on prevention tools, protective devices, technologies, people, and our tactics. What do we do in the parking lot if we've got somebody out there? What do we do in the store? Where should people be positioned? What tasking

and training do they need? What are they doing? How do we keep it random and non-predictable so the offender can't counter what we're doing and so forth? So we're looking at people, programs, and systems from zone 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, and then the opposite again as they go out. If you look at our bowtie model where people move to attack and move from and then potentially to another place. So that's what's going on with affect. for as part of DETECT, that detection component. But this case, we're talking about strategic and tactical share again, and strategic being putting all the information about all the crime we know about by law enforcement, by the participating retailers and other sources into a common operating platform. We can map it, which we're already doing, and can look for dynamics, changes,

and understanding together also what's going on in the community, the surrounding area, that neighborhood that's contributing to crime and loss. And what are the opportunities beyond a place, a person's site, but also in the road networks, the community, and so on. So it's always the organized and, excuse me, the built and the social environment that we're looking at. So those are the three main areas. There's a whole lot. This is just learning how to do it, the tactical share piece, leveraging Motorola radios that are both radio and cellular capable, brand new technology, as well as a platform, an app to keep people connected tactically in those stores, particularly with each other and law enforcement and our SOC lab, but to allow them to share information,

ideas, but also emergent warnings. Somebody's headed your way, and this is what they look like and what they've been doing. So stay tuned. A lot going on, but we're very, very excited that Safer Places Lab, Fort St. Lucie, and Eastside have launched. So look forward to seeing everybody in October, that first week at LPRC Impact. Should be a record crowd, but also an amazing, amazing array of content. Always exciting and neat ways to connect with each other on that Monday evening around the labs inside and out, as well as that Tuesday evening over at the Swamp and the Stadium, and then everything in between. So,

look forward to it. Go to lpresearch.org. With no further ado, let me turn it over to Tony D'Onofrio, and let's see what's going on. Tony? Thank you very much, Reid, and great updates, and congrats on opening that additional lab. So that's really great news. So I'm actually going to mention you a couple of times in this podcast this week because you are all over the news. That is the Loss Prevention Research Council. So let me start first with some interesting news out of the UK, which was published by the industry fashion online magazines. by the industry fashion online magazines. As they reported, new research from the British Retail Consortium, or BRC,

has revealed that incidents of theft have increased, and this was astounding, by 26% across 10 of the largest cities in the UK, with some cities seeing a rise as much as 68%. Major chains and supermarkets have been especially targeted by organized gangs as perpetrators have become bolder, and as the BRC research pointed out, more violent and abusive against retail employees, and that has doubled since the pre-pandemic levels. Incidents which include racial and sexual abuse, physical assault, and threats with weapons has also risen from a pre-COVID high of over 450 per day in 2019 and 2020 to over 850 per day last year. The BRC is once again asking the government

and police to take action and do more to protect workers as retail crime soars across the country. As their CEO of the BRC, Helen Dixon, said, quote, every time I speak with retailers, crime is getting worse. Teams are becoming bolder and more aggressive. Violence and abusive behavior are on the rise. Many employees are facing threats with weapons, physical assault, and racial and sexual abuse.

While there are confrontations, it might be over in a matter of minutes for many victims, their families and colleagues, the physical and emotional impact can last a lifetime. She went on to add retailers are playing their part in investing nearly £1 billion into crime prevention measures in the past year alone, but more needs to be done. So just some disturbing news in terms of what's going on in the UK. Switching topics, I'm going to come back to the United States in a brand new update in terms of what's going on in the UK. Switching topics, I'm going to come back to the United States in a brand-new update in terms of what's happening to malls.

And this was published in the Wall Street Journal, and these are primarily local and regional malls. And this, again, was disturbing. As they reported, older and low-end malls are now worth at least 50%, and in some cases more than 70 percent less than they were when mall valuations peaked in 2016. Now, as they have more than $14 billion in loans backed up by these properties coming due in the next 12 months, according to Moody's analytics, struggling malls are defaulting

on the debt. When mortgage rates are up sharply. Refinancing that debt is going to get even more challenging and expensive. About a fifth of malls financed through commercial mortgage-backed securities are underwater, meaning their properties are worth less than the loans they back. Not all malls are on the brink of disasters newer well-located malls with stronger tenant rosters are generating healthy traffic and returns for investors but even these highly quality malls have declined in value by an estimated 50 percent since 2016. the major reason for this is a widespread closure of department stores as anchor stores, which picked up steam.

Large mall angles like Macy's, Bontown, JCPenney and Sears closed about 875 department stores between 2018 and the end of 2020, compared to a combined just 175 in 2016 to 2017. So local and regional malls continue to be in trouble. just 175 in 2016 to 2017. So local and regional malls continue to be in trouble. And let me switch topics one more time, and this time go to CNBC had one of the most active articles that I actually saw this week. It was on how America's biggest retailers plan to use technology to catch organized retail theft. And of course, this featured the Loss Prevention Research Council and also our Dr. Hayes.

As they reported, Walmart, Target, Lowe's, Kroger, Macy's, and CVS and other major retailers are teaming up with technology companies to develop and deploy next-generation video surveillance systems, facial recognition cameras, license plates, and vehicle readers, autonomous robots, radio RFID, smart case logs, and predictive analytics software. While versions of this type of security have been in place for years, they are now being superpowered by the AI. For retailers and loss prevention, the primary goal of this technology isn't necessarily to catch the thieves in the act,

but rather to make committing these crimes less appealing, turning away before they reach the door. So this sounds familiar. And in fact, as Dr. Hayes said, quote, the first thing we look at, can we detect these people and identify them before they are victims? We are trying to get the offender or coup to say, not here, not now, this doesn't feel right. Launched in 2000 with funding from Target and based at the University of Florida in Gainesville, the Loss Prevention Research Council has tested hundreds of technology and simulation laboratory that recreates different retail environments such as checkout areas and big box stores. As Dr. Hayes went on to say, we conduct large-scale experiments,

much like randomized controlled clinical trials. experiments, much like randomized controlled clinical trials. And Dr. Hayes, as the article reminds us, is the son and grandson of physicians whose part is interest in research. Live high-tech scarecrows prevented wizardry will ward off some criminals, but others fly right past with a tease. One, the easiest job possible. Said Dan Bertrum, who covers technology for chain storage. And if the store has some basic security protocols, they move on to a store that hasn't been hardened. So really good press and coverage for the Loss Prevention Research Council,

and I want to make sure that was mentioned in this podcast because it confirms the great work that is going on. And let me close with one final announcement that I actually made this week, and this is more on a personal note. I just have announced that October 18th, I'm going to host a future of retail day online, and I'm going to host experts from Malaysia to Europe to all over the Americas that will speak on topics such as the future of the retail consumer, the future of retail Silicon Valley startups, the future of generative AI, the future of the world and retail economics, the future of intelligent omnichannel stores, the future of the loss prevention functions, the future of the loss prevention function research, the future of shelf availability, the future of RFID,

the future of computer vision, and the future of the department stores. And again, speakers are coming to us from all over the world, including Dr. Hayes is going to be one of them, and they'll include experts in retail media, computer vision, RFID, on shelf availability. There'll be leaders from Deloitte and IDC that will give us the industry perspective in terms of what's coming on. And then we actually will have some folks from Silicon Valley, venture capitalists that will tell us what they're investing. So you can

see that on my feeds right now in social media. I urge you to register because it should be a very exciting event all day on October 18. And with that, let me turn it over to Tom. Well, thank you, Tony, and thank you, Reid. Excuse my voice, everyone. I have a slight case of laryngitis, but I didn't want to miss this week because I missed last week. I want to start off with a report out of Seattle. The Seattle City Auditor did an audit around organized retail crime, and some of the findings that they had were probably not new or interesting to the listeners here, but are definitely something that shows a greater interest in the challenges that organized retail crime faces.

The auditor's report said that it was a very complex issue, and the focus should be on fencing operations more than the first-line offenders. the focus should be on fencing operations more than the first-line offenders. There was quite a bit in the audit about tackling the fence operations. They also talked about how, in some cases, items that are shoplifted through organized retail crime in Seattle make it to the port within 24 hours and are shipped overseas. They weren't specific to what types of items. But this is interesting for all of us listeners and shows a growing interest in organized retail crime.

The news media as a whole has picked it up more, but now you have city auditors making recommendations. And while I don't think the report was overwhelmingly anything new or that we didn't know, it shows that there's a continued interest. Uber posted its first operating profit in its history. You know, one of the couple things that the report showed, aside from their profit, is that the growth in ride share and rides beyond COVID. So they're now past the pre-COVID levels of rides and deliveries, and they see strong growth ahead.

This is a great indicator of a company that didn't necessarily do well throughout COVID and struggled and went through a massive layoff and restructure, but has kind of found its way. So very good news to hear with the current economic state. Switching gears a little bit to IT news, Meta, the parent company of Facebook, has begun blocking some news links in Canada. This is a response to the Online News Act. One of the things that is going on now is with artificial intelligence and social media,

some of the larger news agencies are working to block people repurposing their content using copyright restrictions. Similar news, OpenAI, the parent company of ChatGPT, has garnered a deal with the associated press to use their data so i think this is the second coming of kind of copyright in the internet space of what will social media companies and artificial intelligence companies do while it's completely legal and okay to share news there are some constituents here who are challenging the fact that they're just basically taking it and and pushing it out. I think there's going to be a lot more to come with this. I don't think this is going to end with the Online News Act.

I think we'll see similar things in the United States where professional news organizations are trying to protect what their research and their time put in and not just allow everybody to regurgitate it. I think there are definitely rules around fair use, but I think we'll watch this space because it could affect all of us. In global drone news, on Monday this week, China imposed restrictions on some exports related to civilian drones that have longer range. This is really due to concerns that these long-range drones are being used for military purposes, both with Russia and Ukraine on both sides.

So these export controls will take effect, and it really is an interesting turn of events where China is taking a role in the space and not picking sides, but simply saying Chinese-made long-range drones will not be exported because of the potential for military use. As we've kind of been covering, Axiom reported that Google plans to overhaul Google Assistant to use generative algorithms like BARD, which is basically BARD is their version of Google's version of ChatGPT. What that means is that the Google Assistant, which is the Siri for Google, will use generative algorithms like BARD to come up with responses. This should be no shock to anybody. This is what I think we all think will be coming. Google is also looking at testing machine-generated text summaries using AI for YouTube, not to replace creator prompts, but to enhance.

There's a new law in China that went into effect restricting generative AI apps and requiring them to obtain a license. Most notably, Apple took quite a few apps off the Apple Store in China in response to this. I think we're going to see a lot of countries come up with laws around AI, and I think it's a very interesting space we should be watching. There are already some EU countries that banned certain types of AI. But as regulatory bodies come into play, this will change what happens. And as we all know, if things are banned or

restricted in some countries, sometimes it can stifle innovation because companies that are innovating are obviously in the business of making money. And if they're out of, if they're restricted from certain markets, I think it will, it will cause a little bit of slowdown. While these are two very different topics, I, I kind of relate to them to when facial recognition became, you know, more widely publicly used or known. It's very similar kind of writing, although obviously generative AI has a much higher adoption rate than facial recognition. A lot of the same banter and challenges are being placed.

With generative AI, I think the one thing that's coming up now is that how do you protect your materials? We talked about copyright copyright but also art so there are quite a few companies that are working on ways to basically make your art or photos non-ai friendly meaning they wouldn't be able to use them so there's going to be a lot there in the ai space and i think that excuse me the last ai news was written from the Financial Times reported that Meta, which is Facebook's parent, plans to launch personas that use chat, GPT-like. And it'll be actually Meta's engine of generative AI. And what that means is you'll have actually chat bots with personalities.

They can include historical figures as well. So you might actually be able to speak to, you know, a famous president like George Washington. And however strange that sounds, but basically what the generative AI would do is they would put in a model and train it on, you know, the information around it. So very, very interesting time for AI. I think we'll continue to push that. And then I'll round off with the three last stories. President Trump was formally indicted on this. This is his fourth indictment.

This is probably the most significant from a crime standpoint. It's a conspiracy to defraud the United States related to the January 6th riot. It is his fourth criminal indictment and definitely the most serious. We'll definitely watch this space. There's a ton of chatter on the internet about this. I don't know that there'll be any civil unrest, but it's definitely something that we'll keep an eye on here at

the LPRC. Another news story they want to talk about is the American's credit rating was just knocked down by Fitch from a perfect AAA to a AA. And the rating agency blamed the politics and debt ceiling standoff and a lot really more about financials and credibility and stability related to the government. So why is this important? This has happened once before, but it shows that some of the political turmoil and other things that are going on could and will affect the economy.

And last, certainly not least, is America just turned on its first nuclear reactor in several years. It took seven years to build. It'll provide power in Georgia for about 500,000 homes. But this is kind of indicative of some of the clean energy pieces here. So when you think of nuclear reactors, I think it was the first reactor turned on, a new reactor turned on in decades, but it was seven years in the making.

So we're continuing to look at this. It's plotted to be the safest nuclear power reactor that has ever been built. It is in the U.S., so it shows that there's kind of a middle ground here where nuclear power for a long time was being shut down throughout the United States. However, when you go travel globally, you see quite a bit more of nuclear power because of its cleanliness and efficiency. Again, I apologize about my voice. And with that, I'll turn it back over to Reeve. All right.

Well, thank you so much, Tom, for all that great information. Thank you so much, Tony. Good stuff. Thank you so much, Tom, for all that great information. Thank you so much, Tony. Good stuff. And there is a lot going on, and I think we're all very appreciative, Tony, of what you're doing in this case. And we really love the idea of pulling together tech leaders, thought leaders, people that are out there not just talking about things but are doing things as well across the globe. Because there are people in different countries and different

parts of each country that are doing things that we just don't know about and vice versa, or they found out things we need to know or things we don't need to be doing or doing it that way. So I'm excited about your conference. We're looking forward to some other engagements out there. So I want everybody to please stay in touch, lpresearch.org. Always reach out to us at operations at lpresearch.org if you've got some good info to share, some ideas or ways that we need to be doing things just a little better. So everybody stay in touch. Stay safe. Thanks for listening to the Crime Science Podcast presented by the Loss Prevention Research Council. If you enjoyed today's episode, you can find more crime science episodes and valuable information

at lpresearch.org. The content provided in the Crime Science Podcast is for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for legal, financial, or other advice. Views expressed by guests of the Crime Science Podcast are those of the authors and do not reflect the opinions or positions of the Loss Prevention Research Council.