UK Crime Rate to Soar 40% Once Cybercrimes Included

The inclusion of cybercrime in the statistics "will add an extra three million fraud and cyber incidents to the overall level of crime in the UK – an increase of up to 40%," according to City of London Police Commissioner Adrian Leppard.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — The crime rate for England and Wales is expected to rise by up to 40 percent due to the inclusion of cybercrimes into police statistics, officials revealed on Thursday.

The inclusion of cybercrime in the statistics "will add an extra three million fraud and cyber incidents to the overall level of crime in the UK – an increase of up to 40%," City of London Police Commissioner Adrian Leppard was quoted by the Guardian as saying.

Indeed, cybercrimes could add some 3.8 million cases to the crime survey in England and Wales, the UK Office for National Statistics said.

Earlier this year, the Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW) reveled that crime rates had fallen by seven percent in the year ending March, 2015, amounting to 6.8 million offenses, which was the lowest estimate in decades. The survey at that time excluded fraud and cybercrime, although there was reportedly ongoing development work on the issue.

In June, the UK National Crime Agency announced that the country's losses from various kinds of cybercrime exceed $24 billion annually.