A new report says Apple paid more than $1.2 million in one year to privately hire police to protect three of its San Francisco retail stores. The payment was said to have been made through a private security company.
San Francisco allows private companies to pay police officers to protect their shops and offices, and the report says that many tech companies take advantage of this …
To many of us, the idea that a private company can hire serving police officers to provide security for their premises seems a bizarre one. But a Wired report says that this is perfectly commonplace in San Francisco.
The contracting program is known locally as 10B, which is also the section of the city code authorizing it. Any person, company, or organization that desires extra personnel or equipment for “law enforcement purposes” can request “such personnel to perform such services,” as long as the police chief signs off on it first. Under the law, companies pay the same hourly rates for officers that the city would.
Tech companies are said to be big customers, including Apple.
Airbnb, for example, spent roughly $428,443 for the presence of uniformed, armed officers in 2024, the most recent year for which complete data was received. Salesforce shelled out about $727,907 through a security vendor […]
The firm Security Industry Specialists paid over $1.2 million in 2024 for what police records described as coverage at three Apple stores, making it the year’s second-largest customer.
The practice isn’t limited to California, with Wired reporting that around 80% of police departments across the US allow officers to moonlight as private security.
Unsurprisingly, there are conflicting views on the practice. Some argue that it creates potential conflicts of interest, and can leave officers too tired to perform their primary role effectively. Others argue that it puts more uniformed police on the streets at no cost to taxpayers.
Photo by Fred Moon on Unsplash
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