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Comment by ISL | Hacker News Reader

Like adversaries who attempt to outrun a radio, "outsmarting" law enforcement who have your license-plate number is a generally poor strategy.

Likewise, putting the police-department's SIM in your phone has some pretty clear downsides.

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It isn’t actually law enforcement, though. It’s some division of the university which is enforcing parking rules.

Right, but student codes of conduct may have a word about that.

My guess was that the university couldn’t really enforce its paper tickets because they weren’t real police, so they resorted to boots and barnacles.

I think my university made it a condition of graduation that any outstanding fines were paid.

Of course, since it was in London, the only student I ever met with a car had a serious physical disability.

I would think most businesses have a civil court case as part of an agreement you sign as you become a student of the school?

Or businesses in general with trespass law?

I don't believe campus police actually has any legal power. It also isn't the police department's SIM card, Barnacle owns it - of course it's still considered theft.

It's worse than legal trouble. They hold your graduation until you return all library books, pay all debts, fines, and interest, etc etc.

The usual trick is to drive someone else’s car. (Mom’s or dad’s).

Depends on where you go. My college had a legitimate police department with duly authorized officers that could arrest, carry guns, etc.

This is common for public universities, for the obvious reason: they're already a branch of the state, so it makes sense for security to officially be state police.

They're often not state police, but a small police department.

Depends on the campus. At the University of Pittsburgh, campus police are an accredited law enforcement agency with jurisdiction within so many hundreds of feet of University property. Ditto for our transit police.

In my locale, "campus police" is a division of the city police department.

It seems difficult to crack down on removing the things. It sounds like they're easy enough to detach that even people who aren't the owner might steal them, or at least break into them for the unlimited SIM card.

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