This is the shocking moment a young woman had her phone stolen by a pickpocket - from right under her nose.<br /><br />Isolde Stephens, 21, was having dinner with her cousin at Xian Biang Biang Noodles in Covent Garden, London when the incident happened. <br /><br />The pair were sitting outside when a woman wearing a hat and mask over her face approached them. <br /><br />She began asking for food and as she pointed at a plate, she covered Isolde's phone with a begging sign and covertly stole her phone.<br /><br />Isolde, who was visiting from Amsterdam, Netherlands, said: "We'd only been there for about half an hour before it happened.<br /><br />"She just came up to us and was asking for food while pointing to some food I'd ordered.<br /><br />"Then she put the paper over the phone and took the phone away under the paper.<br /><br />"She walked away pretty slowly and I didn't think anything else of it until ten minutes later when I realised my phone was gone.<br /><br />"I searched my bags and my pockets and then I remembered her coming over."<br /><br />Isolde informed the staff at the restaurant, who checked the CCTV and showed her what had happened.<br /><br />Isolde said: "The workers brought out the CCTV to show me straight away.<br /><br />"They said they deal with the woman often and she operates in the area a lot.<br /><br />"Once I saw what had happened, I tried running up and down the street to find the woman, but she was no where to be seen."<br /><br />Isolde was able to track her phone using Find My iPhone and reported the incident to the police.<br /><br />She said: "We ended up tracking the phone for a while because we could see it moving on Find My iPhone.<br /><br />"The phone stayed overnight at an address in Barking and then was gone far out of London the next morning.<br /><br />"The police took everything down that I was saying but they didn't seem very hopeful.<br /><br />"The woman must be a professional because she hid herself on the CCTV so she can't be identified.<br /><br />"The police said they'd visit the residence in Barking the day of the theft but I guess they didn't based off the fact it stayed there the night and travelled away the next morning."
