From a Dh2 million diamond necklace to sentimental keepsakes, officers trace lost property across international borders using an integrated smart platform.
DUBAI: Dubai Police have successfully recovered and returned 6,040 lost items to owners around the globe over the past five years, leveraging a specialized smart delivery system that ships reunited valuables directly to international addresses.
The initiative allows tourists and residents to recover misplaced property—including luxury timepieces, high-value jewelry, and sentimental keepsakes—without needing to travel back to the United Arab Emirates.
Among the high-profile recoveries managed by the force’s Lost and Found Department was a diamond necklace valued at more than Dh2 million, along with a Dh150,000 Rolex watch returned to a tourist in Eastern Europe.
The recovery process relies on a unified digital network established in 2015 that links approximately 1,600 strategic partners across Dubai, including international airports, hotel chains, shopping malls, and municipal entities. Through this portal, members of the public and commercial establishments can register found items, enabling officers to cross-reference reported losses against centralized inventory databases.
“We have contacted individuals who had no idea they had misplaced anything in the first place,” said First Lieutenant Reem Al Hosani, head of the Communications and Complaints Follow-up Section at the Lost and Found Department. She noted that officers often initiate contact with unsuspecting owners, coordinating door-to-door delivery once identity verification is complete.
Under UAE lost-property legislation, owners have a three-month window to claim recovered items before they are cleared for legal public auctions. Proceeds from any auctioned goods are held in reserve for three years, ensuring legitimate owners can claim the monetary value if located later.
To protect high-value assets, Dubai Police maintain specialized secure vaults equipped with laboratory apparatus to verify precious metals and gemstones. When identification data on site is insufficient, officers extend inquiries internationally. In one instance, police identified the owner of a Dh40,000 luxury watch by liaising with brand retail outlets in France to trace transaction logs back to a tourist in Russia.
While multi-million dirham jewelry features prominently in official logs, department officials emphasize that equal operational resources are dedicated to items with high emotional value. Senior officers recalled tracing the owner of a SIM-less mobile phone containing unpublished poetry, as well as handling cases involving items of nominal monetary worth that held deep family significance.
