Mobile phone thefts in London soared to an all-time high last year, with nearly 330 being stolen every day on the streets of the British capital.
According to Metropolitan Police figures seen by the Daily Mail, a record 116,656 mobile phone thefts were recorded in 2024, or around 13 per hour.
This represented a rise of 1,300 over the previous year and more than a fifty per cent jump since 2017 when the figure stood at around 77,000.
The dataset found that theives were more likely to target women, with 61,000 phone theft victims being women in 2024, compared to 48,000 male victims.
Despite the soaring levels of phone thefts, London’s police force — often criticised for spending valuable manpower hours policing supposedly offensive comments online — only managed to charge 169 suspects, seven of whom were let off with a warning.
The data, which was obtained through a Freedom of Information request from the Crush Crime campaign group, found that nearly 684,000 phones were stolen in total between 2017 and 2024, accounting for a loss approximately £365 million in value.
Commenting on the figures, Crush Crime founder, Dr Lawrence Newport, said: “We are in the midst of a phone theft epidemic, and our government is failing to act.
“Our politicians need to wake up to reality: they need to stop this epidemic, and push our justice system to catch, convict and imprison these career criminals.”
Dr Newport went on to note that half of all crime is committed by just 10 per cent of offenders, indicating that most of the phone thefts are likely committed by a relatively small band of career criminals.
Police have previously attributed the rise in thefts to organised crime groups, many of which deploy masked mandits on high-speed electric bikes, who snatch phones and speed off from pedestrians.
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper addressed the growing issue in January, saying: “Over the last few years, mobile phone thefts have shot up – often driven by organised crime – leaving our streets feeling less safe. That has to change.”
In addition to rising phone theft crime, London has seen an 18 per cent rise in gun crime, a nine per cent rise in rape, 11 per cent rise in sexual offences, 38 per cent rise in shoplifiting and business roberries over the past year, according to figures from the Greater London Authority.
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