The UK government unsurprisingly finds that the iPhone 5s is more prone to theft

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The UK government published a new report highlighting mobile theft in the country. According to the statistics, iPhones are more likely to be targeted in a theft, followed by BlackBerry smartphones and Samsung's offerings.

Analysis of hundreds of thousands of data points describing theft in London from 1 August 2012 to 5 January 2014 shows that over 50 per cent of all phones stolen were Apple iPhones. The brand with the next highest percentage of mobile phones stolen is Blackberry, followed by Samsung.

The government's research indicates that most handsets are stolen through pick-pocketing, or when a handset is left unattended for a short amount of time. London seems to witness a majority of smartphone-related thefts, with the city bearing witness to over 100,000 thefts last year. Handset manufacturers are actively looking to curtail mobile-related thefts by introducing activation lock and data deletion features, and while such services are not yet mandatory in the UK, the government is advising all smartphone users to register for these utilties.

Head on to the source link below to read the UK government's findings in full.

Source: UK Government; Via: BBC

Harish Jonnalagadda
Harish Jonnalagadda

The clumsiest man in tech.

7 Comments
  • I saw this on the BBC and was disappointed that they made no reference to the biometric security on the iPhone 5s is having an impact on thefts in New York. I think this trend is worth pointing out since many people may be considering buying a new phone soon and this could influence their decision (several flagship phones have fingerprint scanners now).
    I was surprised then, to see the headline of this article; it implies that the 5s is the most targeted phone, which runs contrary to other studies. A quick glance at the report shows that while the 'iPhone 5s is more prone to theft' compared to, say a 4s, it is less prone to theft than a 5c or 5. I would be interested to know whether this is because the 5s had not long been released and so knowledge of its fingerprint scanner had not spread far enough in the criminal community or whether in the UK there is a trend towards not using Touch ID which renders it ineffective.
    Regardless, this headline is misleading and I expect more thought from iMore.
  • Don't worry, I doubt many of the iPhones stolen were iPhone 5S's, the phone was only on sale for less than 4 months before the analysis ends and I use the word analysis loosely. It is poorly compiled and was poorly reported with no real breakdown of actual models of device. Let's face it, when the 2nd most stolen is the Blackberry and Blackberry have been struggling to sell their devices!
  • Because it's popular Sent from the iMore App
  • Samsung will soon be hiring thugs to steal S5's to give the appearance of that phone as being more popular. haha
  • Errmmm its being stolen coz it would give better value than the rest. Sent from the iMore App
  • one simple reason for this could be that the overinflated price of a new iphone leaves more of spread to sell the phone on the black market. were as other smartphones have less of a spread between stolen good and fairly priced 2nd hand phones. It is that or iphone users are just more lax about securing there phones, or those willing to buy stolen phones are more likely to want an iphone.
  • This is the most inaccurate title I have ever read. If the data, as YOUR QUOTE states, ranges from 1st August 2012 through to 5th January 2014 how does that make the iPhone 5S the device most prone to theft! The fact that it wasn't until the introduction of the iPhone 5S and iOS 7 that Apple built in a 'kill switch' system where you could brick your phone if it was stolen or missing making it unusable and almost valueless to the thief. In fact more accurate up to date data collected in Cities like San Francisco and New York City has shown that since iOS was introduced in October 2013 the Apple iPhone is far less desirable and shown a decline in theft while Android device thefts have increased. Showing that the Apple 'kill switch' system has had a positive impact on the issue of iPhone theft. So maybe Harish Jonnalagadda should reword the piece and maybe reflect that this information is not quite as accurate as it could be due to the lack of detailed data collection and how it was presented by the report compilers. In fact maybe a full read of every word, sentence, paragraph and page should be done to make sure that the information being reported is not inaccurate or misrepresenting a situation. Furthermore the iPhone model most stolen is the iPhone 5 not the 5S and that the actual numbers involved are relatively small and they even declare on page 14 that iOS 7 has had an impact on the theft of iPhones. So the blogger above merely too the information sensationalized from a BBC report and replicated the sensationalized report without checking the research figures himself!