The index crimes in the first six months of this year went down by 10.14 percent compared to the same period in 2022, the Philippine National Police (PNP) disclosed on Monday, July17. Index crimes include murder, homicide, physical injury, rape, robbery, theft, motorcycle theft and vehicle theft—which the PNP refers to as Eight Focus Crimes. Citing collated data across the country, PNP spokesperson Col. Jean Fajardo said carnapping of vehicles registered the highest decline with 28.90 percent—or from 173 from January to June in 2022 to 123 this year. This was followed by Physical Injury with 20.01 percent, or from 2,893 to 2,314; and, Rape with 18.19 percent, or from 5,025 to 4,111. Theft went down by 9.33 percent, or from 6,506 to 5,899; Caranapping of Motorcycles with 8.82 percent decline, or from 998 to 910; and, Murder with 1.89 percent, or from 2,177 to 2,077. Robbery, however, went up by 6.86 percent, or from 2,434 to 2,601; and, Homicide with 2.75 percent increase, or from 511 to 525. The figures, however, do not include cybercrimes which were earlier reported to have increased by around 192 percent nationwide, and 152 percent in Metro Manila. “We are now conducting a study to determine if these cybercrime-related activities could be included in our index crimes,” said Fajardo. Based on the data released by the PNP-AntiCybercrime Group, a total of 4,104 SIM card-aided crimes were reported from January to June this year, compared to only 1,415 in the same period in 2022. SIM-card aided crimes, according to PNP-ACG, include GCash-related transactions, Text scams, bank frauds and fake news. The PNP-ACG, however, noted that it solved almost all of the reported incidents. Fajardo said a technical working group (TWG) was created to look into suggestions that cyber-crime related incidents must be included since they are both crimes against property and persons.