Local Social media full of attempted dog theft gossip?

[lljkk]

Mine is... But incredibly vague and there's usually no actual snatching attempt or the details given are so brief that I am not sure of true picture. I can't tell what is paranoia & what is legit concern. Is this happening on your local social media pages? Examples (entirety of details given):

"Beware of dog thieves! A strange couple approached my dog excitedly but then lost interest and walked away because my dog is too old"

or

"Beware dog theft attempt! Eastern European woman in blue car followed dog owners on popular local walking route, now dog owner is very distressed."

or

"Man tried to snatch my dog but dropped dog who bit them, thank goodness" (*)

(*) I'm wondering what owner actually saw, like maybe dog ran up & bit man & man was wrestling dog off is all owner actually saw.

@KatyMac

There have been lots in our area too I was a bit sceptical and then this happened at the weekend

Maybe I should mention i live in Ipswich so maybe the increased social media posts about missing dogs and the stolen dogs found locally were connected

Ours is as well but there has been an awful lot of dogs taken in the area. However it there was a post a few weeks ago saying that such a van and its driver was going up and down lanes. They posted a picture. Turns out it was one of the local postmen.

The best one I saw recently was someone wondering if the pile of dog shit outside his house was a way of marking that there was a dog in there so someone could steal it.

Much froth about a “burgundy van” too. Apparently the driver and his mate have been leaping out brandishing knives at dog walkers. The local police remain silent about this. They do get things wrong sometimes but awareness of and tracking down potential knife crime isn’t generally one of them.

Yes! We have this too. I was a bit worried at first but I think it's the latest urban myth.

We even had local police post a video on Facebook saying that they don't know where these claims are coming from because there have been no reports of thefts to them whatsoever.

yeah, our police also issued a statement that dog theft reports were "extremely rare" !

I say this on all these threads, but a dog going missing and being reported "stolen" on social media is not the same as a dog actually being stolen.

I would take anything that doesn't come from an official police source with a very large pinch of salt. I see a lot of posts about "stolen dogs" and the vast majority turn up, having gone missing on walks, or escaping out of open gates or doors.

I do wonder if we are too laid back but I don't have social media apart from instagram so see no real hysteria. Our pup is off lead and we have never been concerned. I see a lot of businesses selling 'anti theft' leads which basically is an extra slip loop that costs about 15 quid to go around your wrist? Seems a good way to make money off people's worry but nothing is new there.

It is definitely happening in my area, and rightly so people are concerned about it. There has even been a detective assigned to the matter, and they don’t do that for a small problem. No all information is urban myth.

I mean, as an example - my dog ran off in the woods after a deer yesterday.

What was to stop me going on Facebook and saying I suspected he'd been stolen, even though I knew full well what had happened?

I think some people are missing the point. Nobody is saying NO dog thefts are happening. They definitely are, and it does seem to be on the rise, and people need to take sensible precautions and be vigilant. However, what doesn’t help matters at all is hundreds of posts a day saying ‘an Asian/Eastern European/Traveller looking man walked near me and looked at my dog, beware!’ Nor have I seen any proof that the 83 dogs recovered in Ipswich were marked out for theft with chalk or cable ties. Have you?

I just did a quick Google and found multiple headlines with warnings to dog walkers about the cable ties, and yet they all include some half hearted statement from the police in that area saying ‘we have no reason to think the cable ties have anything to do with dog thieves but by all means do remove them if you’re concerned’. People don’t care because most of them only read the headline and then click ‘share’ and thus the rumours are perpetuated.

Someone in my Nextdoor group said she had ‘proof’ that the cable ties near the church yard were for dog thieves and linked to an earlier social media post of her own as said ‘proof’, which just said that she’d seen a suspicious man while walking her dog in that churchyard. It just goes round in circles!

Again, nobody is saying it doesn’t happen but the hysteria and suspicion of every innocent person who glances at your dog while out for a stroll isn’t going to help anybody. There are people in my local groups who say they are now too scared to walk their dogs because dog thieves are ‘everywhere’ and it must mean their dogs are starved for exercise, which surely isn’t what anyone would want

As an example, there’s a post from a woman today in my local group which says she was walking her dog and a young lad walked past her and got his phone out. Then on her way home an ‘Eastern European’ couple walked towards her, and she seems to have extrapolated that the young lad must have summoned them and told them where she was, and she ‘knew they were about to steal my dog’ but then she got her phone out and they ‘knew she was onto them’ so they went in a different direction. There’s absolutely nothing of substance in the post that would suggest any of these people were doing anything other than walking in the local park, but half the comments are of the ‘omg scumbags, I hope you called the police!!!’ nature.

Makes me think that if I’m ever out for a walk and happen to look at a dog or get my phone out then I’m going to end up on Nextdoor as a ‘suspicious Eastern European looking’ woman who attempted to steal someone’s dog (I’m not Eastern European but I’m also not clear on what makes someone look ‘Eastern European’ so you never know!)