The dramatic 40 percent increase in the recently published crime statistics for England and Wales might appear an abrupt end to the year-on-year decline in crime rates over the past 20 years or so. But in fact this substantial leap is explained by the inclusion for the first time of estimates of online fraud and cybercrime in the official statistics.
This raises the question as to whether crime is migrating online and if so, might this explain the crime drop—the continued fall in reported crime since the 1990s. It’s important to realize that these aren’t all new crimes—just unreported in this format until now.
Crime statistics give us information about changes in criminal behavior, but should never be used as an indicator of the overall health of society.
