Tracker’s latest statistics indicate business-owned vehicles, such as cargo trucks and couriers, are 48% more likely to be targeted than personally-owned vehicles.
The vehicle telematics and recovery company released data for January to June 2025 this week. During the first half of the year, the company claims to have recovered 3,671 vehicles and assisted in 146 arrests.
According to Tracker, the trend is largely driven by hijackings, with notable shifts in both timing and location – Mpumalanga has emerged as a new hotspot, and incidents are increasingly occurring during the week rather than at weekends.
The Tracker Vehicle Crime Index aggregates information from Tracker’s subscription pool, in excess of 1.1-million users.
The data indicates that business-owned vehicles experience 32% more crime than their proportion within the Tracker base, highlighting a significantly higher risk compared to personally owned vehicles. The majority of this crime – 57% – occurs in Gauteng.
Nationally, hijackings of business-owned vehicles occur at nearly double the rate of thefts.
Regionally, this trend is more pronounced: in the Western Cape, business vehicle hijackings are five times more likely than theft; in the Eastern Cape, four times more likely; and in Mpumalanga, three times more likely. While the Western Cape and Eastern Cape were identified as hijacking hotspots last year, Mpumalanga has now joined the list.
For personal vehicles, the national split between hijacking and theft is equal. However, in the Eastern Cape, hijackings are five times more likely than theft and twice as likely in Mpumalanga and Limpopo.
Whereas most vehicle crime was previously reported at weekends, hijackings are now mainly reported on Thursdays between 4pm and 9pm. Theft continues to be most commonly reported on Saturdays between 11am and 4pm.
Regionally, the most prominent day and time for hijackings varies: Gauteng shows a tendency toward Tuesdays between 11am and 4pm; KwaZulu-Natal, Wednesdays from 4pm to 9pm; and the Western Cape, Wednesdays from 6am to 11am.
According to chief operating officer Duma Ngcobo, businesses have solutions to safeguard their fleets, including technologies such as dashcams with facial recognition, 360-degree cameras, safe zone management, cargo door sensors, and emergency driver assist buttons.
“These tools enable fleet managers to respond swiftly to incidents, additionally, subscribing drivers to rapid emergency armed response services can further enhance safety.”