Mobile phone thefts on UK rail network surge 135 per cent in five years

A mobile phone is stolen every 44 minutes on Britain’s rail network, according to new figures from the British Transport Police. 

The data, obtained via a Freedom of Information request, reveals that around 12,150 handsets were stolen on trains and at railway stations in 2024, up sharply from 5,167 in 2020. This is a rise of 135 per cent in five years.

The upward trend has accelerated since 2021, when just 3,508 incidents were recorded. By September 2024, 9,096 thefts had already been logged, with the full-year total extrapolated to 12,150. This equates to 33 devices per day.

The Crime Survey for England and Wales estimates that 78,000 people experienced a phone or bag theft in the year to March 2024, while the Met Police reported that £50 million worth of mobile devices were stolen in London alone last year.

The National Crime Agency reckons many of the stolen phones are shipped overseas to markets such as China and Morocco, while others are exploited for the data they contain.

Arif Reza, CEO of global eSIM provider  WorldSIM, said the figures highlight both the financial and personal disruption caused by handset thefts. “New smartphones costing well over £1,000 are a major target for organised gangs. But the real damage comes from the fact that most people rely on their phones for work, payments and personal data,” he said.

He says eSIMs can help reduce disruption as they cannot be swapped or cloned, andcan be activated immediately on another device. This allows customers to quickly restore services such as email, banking and messaging without waiting for a replacement SI< card.”