Good to know. Here I was believing that Japanese society was so advanced they couldn't even conceive of theft.

I did feel a major sense of safety in Tokyo, however.

Yeah. I think it's more likely to stop someone accidentally taking the wrong bike. Since they aren't secured to anything and the locks aren't beefy, defeating it would be pretty trivial.

I have a number of friends with anecdotes about forgetting items on a bus/train and the lengths to which individuals or companies will go to return them is pretty impressive.