Reuters reports that British Home Secretary John Reid is planning to approach Apple and Sony to join a summit that will focus on fighting crime in Britain. Reid wants mobile phone and mp3 player manufacturers to focus as much on security features for their devices as on other design features.

"New technology, lifestyle changes, new commodities and new gadgets mean that the criminals continually move on," Reid told the BBC's Sunday AM program. "So when we defeat them on mobile phones, they move on to Sat-Navs and then on to iPods." Reuters noted that crime figures released last week showed an 8% increase in the number of street robberies in Britain.

"We already have a close working relationship with mobile phone manufacturers," a Home Office spokesman said on Sunday. "John Reid is likely to approach Apple and Sony in the coming weeks to join this summit." The spokesman also added that during the coming week, they will be drawing up a list of other manufacturers to include for the summit.