Irish motorists warned about growing number of airbag thieves

Irish motorists have been warned about an increasing crime here in Ireland that could end up being fatal as criminals steal airbags from our cars without us knowing.

When you find that your car has been broken into you’d naturally start looking to see if anything expensive has been stolen, like your sat-nav or your limited edition McDonald's Olympic coloured plastic cup – the important things, you know? However, would you ever guess that your airbag had been robbed? Probably not seeing as these ballsy crooks are getting away with it completely undetected.

That’s why Netwatch, Ireland’s leading protection specialists, have been raising their voice in order to warn the nation’s motorists.

David Walsh, Group CEO of Netwatch said, “We are seeing increasing incidents of this type of crime, leading us to believe that airbags are becoming the car stereo of the 21st century for auto criminals. Even for someone with little mechanical knowledge of a car, they are relatively easy to slip out. If the steering column is sufficiently well replaced, an unsuspecting motorist might not even realise that the car has been tampered with.”

“Replacing an airbag can be extremely costly and shady operators can make a huge profit by using a stolen bag rather than a new one from the manufacturer. This makes the trade in stolen airbags extremely lucrative for thieves that have identified customers willing to take these compromised bags. The danger to motorists is two fold – potentially you could be driving a car that has had a faulty bag installed, or indeed a car that has had its airbag removed.”

So the next time you leave the car unintentionally open or you come back to find the driver’s side window all over the pavement, you might want to check that the steering column is in full working order.