Criminals and domestic violence perpetrators are increasingly using GPS tracking devices to commit serious crime, with the NSW Crime Commission recommending tighter controls over sales.
Australian-first findings from the Commission, released Tuesday, have shown one in four people who purchased GPS tracking devices since 2023 have a history of domestic violence.
The data was obtained from a range of retailers who sold 5,500 GPS tracking devices to 3,000 individuals.
By matching this sales data against criminal history and intelligence records, it was also revealed that 37 per cent of customers who had purchased tracking devices were adversely known to police, 15 per cent had a history of serious and organised crime and 9 per cent had a history of both domestic and family violence and serious and organised crime.
And at the time of purchase, 126 customers of these tracking devices were AVO defendants (those with an apprehended violence order).
The analysis has shown that a high number of offenders convicted of offences had used GPS tracking devices as a tool in their criminality.
In NSW, it’s an offence to install a tracking device to track someone without their consent.
Speaking to the latest report, NSW Crime Commissioner Michael Barnes said the crime being facilitated with tracking devices included murder, kidnapping and drug trafficking, along with extensive use by high risk domestic and family violence offenders.
“Tracking devices are frequently used by organised crime networks to monitor, locate, and ultimately attack their rivals, in fact they are now part of standard toolkit for violent organised crime,’’ Commissioner Barnes said, adding that these devices were accessible, inexpensive and easily concealed.
The report’s findings were part of Project Hakea, which the Commission commenced to investigate the use of tracking and other surveillance devices as an enabler of serious and organised crime in NSW.
The project also examined the conduct of some private investigators (PI) and spy stores, with Commissioner Barnes saying “there are some individuals in the PI industry who appear to be knowingly facilitating crime, or even committing crime themselves by clandestinely tracking targets at the behest of their clients.”
Domestic and family violence
With 25 per cent of customers who purchased tracking devices since 2023 having a history of domestic and family violence, the need for action is urgent.
The Commission’s report states there’s a significant body of evidence that the most dangerous period for DFV victims is the period immediately following a separation, with 58 per cent of intimate partner homicides occurring after a planned or actual separation.
Alarmingly, Project Hakea’s data shows 75 per cent of offenders charged with DFV-related tracking devices started tracking the victim following a separation.
In two particular cases, the Commission says the offenders continued to monitor their partners while incarcerated for domestic violence offences.
Another case highlighted in the report, where a tracking device was utilised, involved a male offender who shot and killed his wife in regional NSW before shooting himself.
The couple had been married for more than 25 years and were not known to law enforcement for any previous domestic violence, but in the month before the woman’s murder, the male offender had used a GPS tracking device, purchased from an instore automotive parts retailer, to monitor the victim’s movements.
This tracking occurred until at least the day before the murder, and the offender’s children and neighbour were aware of the tracking, which ultimately appeared to form part of a series of behaviours that the offender used to prevent the victim from leaving the relationship.
CEO of top Domestic and Family Violence Organisation Women’s Community Shelters, Annabelle Daniel, OAM tells Women’s Agenda they’ve been seeing increasing levels of technological surveillance from women accessing their shelters.
“We have found tracking tiles in teddy bears, hidden in the wheel arches of prams, and had residents tracked through fitbits left in vehicles.”
“Surveillance devices enhance an abuser’s ability to stalk their partner and children, allowing them to know their whereabouts constantly and create a climate of ‘omnipresence’ by the abuser,” says Daniel.
“This can induce significant fear and isolation in victims with every social contact they have with someone becoming a risk they may later be questioned about. If an abuser also demonstrates a high level of sexual jealousy, then the risk to the victim increases significantly.”
A challenge for law enforcement
While these findings are incredibly alarming, Commissioner Barnes said the offending was challenging for law enforcement to tackle “due to under regulation of the sale of these devices”.
“Regulation aimed at increasing the ability of law enforcement to investigate exactly who is purchasing these devices and to match a device that is found to a purchaser will allow more proactive efforts by law enforcement to disrupt offending before it occurs,” said Commissioner Barnes.
The Crime Commission has made five recommendations for reform, aimed at reducing access to tracking devices by criminals, strengthening criminal legislation to reflect the seriousness of this type of offending and increasing community safety.
The report recommends safety features including anti-stalking measures, and tighter controls over the sale of tracking devices, particularly by ensuring anyone with an AVO be banned from buying them.
Coercive control is set to become a criminal offence in NSW from July 1, with a maximum penalty of seven years of imprisonment.
The definition of coercive control involves perpetrators using patterns of abusive behaviours over time in a way that creates fear and denies liberty and autonomy, and this includes behaviour that tracks a person’s movements or communications.