More than a dozen people were arrested this morning in dawn raids targeting the gangs selling on stolen mobile phones.

British Transport Police have spent the last year investigating a suspected crime ring in which handsets are stolen to order from train and tube passengers before being sold on in bulk.

This morning officers searched homes, businesses and storage units in Ealing, Harrow, Hounslow and other areas, where they arrested 13 people and seized about 1,000 mobiles, along with large sums of cash.

Chief Superintendent Paul Brogden, who led the operation, said: "The group targeted today is suspected of acquiring hundreds of handsets, many believed to have been stolen from passengers on trains and the Tube across London and the Home Counties.

"This is organised crime, masterminded by career-criminals dealing in large quantities of stolen gadgets every day, fuelling the network of thieves who operate on London's transport network."

BTP has worked with the Met Police to track stolen phones to the criminal gangs selling them on, often overseas.

Some of the handsets recovered by British Transport Police during a crackdown on mobile phone theft

Twelve men and a woman were arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to handle stolen goods and money laundering. Three other men were arrested for immigration offences. They are all currently in police custody.

They included four men from Northolt, aged 53, 41, 23 and 18; a 38-year-old man and a 35-year-old woman from Brentford; a 42-year-old man from Hounslow; two men from Southall, aged 40 and 30; a 43-year-old man from Stanmore; and a 36-year-old man from Harrow.

* You can register your smart phone, tablet, laptop or other devices for free on the National Property Register at www.immobilise.com to improve your chance of recovering them should they be stolen.