The addresses if around 30.000 fireman and shotgun owners are handed to a direct mail marketing agency for a commercial firm’s advertising campaign. The gun owners in London are questioning the Metropolitan Police about this incident.
The people first came to know this dwhen a leaflet landed on their doormats in Tuesday’s post.
Titled as “Protect your firearms and shotguns with Smartwater”, this leaflet – which features the Met Police logos – advises the firearm and shotgun certificate holders to buy a “firearms protection pack at a reduced price” of about £8.95.
This Smartwater is basically an invisible ink. You can mark your property using it and if any case you are burgled, police can use UV light readers to see to whom it rightfully belongs. The company behind this was formed by an ex-police detective and his chemist brother, and this firm has since forged their very close links with a number of police forces in the UK. Their website boasts of the crime-reducing properties “traceable liquid”, something that is actively endorsed by police.
The promotional firearms security packs being peddled by Smartwater and the Met appear to be little more than a small can of the “traceable liquid” and the “right to display SmartWater’s THIEVES BEWARE® deterrent signage for 5 YEARS”, as the product page puts it.
The security implications of the Met distributing home addresses of the capital’s 30,000 gun owners (about 5,000 rifle owners and 25,000 shotgun owners) are severe.
It is not clear why firearms and shotguns stamped with serial numbers recorded against the owner’s name and address on a police-controlled database need extra marking. The forensic scientists are very easily capable of reading a filed-off or an altered serial number, two of the most common tricks criminals used in the hope of making their illegally acquired guns become untraceable.