In 2023, the crime rate in Russia reached approximately 1,300 offenses per 100,000 population, marking a slight decrease compared to the previous year. Over the period from 2015 to 2023, the rate saw a decline by 303 registered crimes per 100,000 people. What are the most common offenses in Russia? Fraud and theft are the most frequent types of crime in Russia. New types of fraud emerged with the development of digital banking, including crimes related to personal data thefts, access to bank accounts, and unauthorized payment card transactions. Approximately 40 percent of crimes in Russia are of little gravity. Criminals’ profile The largest share of people who committed offenses in Russia are aged between 30 and 49 years, among both genders. While most criminals in the country finished up to nine school classes, more than one third of all perpetrators received a secondary professional education. Furthermore, among female criminals, over 15 percent are university graduates.

Approximately 98 percent of female criminals in Russia in 2021 possessed a Russian passport. Among men who committed a crime in the country, nearly four percent had a nationality of another state or were classified as stateless persons.

The homicide rate in Russia reached *** homicides per 100,000 population in 2023. The indicator has declined steadily since 2002, when it was measured at **** murders per 100,000 inhabitants. Over the years observed, the highest rate was recorded at **** homicides per 100,000 persons in 1994. Homicide in Russia The significant decrease in intentional homicides characterizes the general reduction in crime in Russia since the 1990s. However, murder remains one of the major causes of death in the country. In total, over 7,600 homicides and attempted homicides were recorded in Russia in 2022. Victims of homicide The number of male victims of homicide per 100,000 inhabitants in Russia was approximately ***** times higher than the murder rate of women. A United Nations study showed that while most people who were killed around the globe were men, women were most likely to be murdered by their partners, ex-partners, and family members.

Russia crime rate per 100K population for 2021 was 6.80, a 7.44% decline from 2020.

<ul style='margin-top:20px;'>

<li>Russia crime rate per 100K population for 2020 was <strong>7.35</strong>, a <strong>4.43% decline</strong> from 2019.</li>
<li>Russia crime rate per 100K population for 2019 was <strong>7.69</strong>, a <strong>6.43% decline</strong> from 2018.</li>
<li>Russia crime rate per 100K population for 2018 was <strong>8.21</strong>, a <strong>10.12% decline</strong> from 2017.</li>
</ul>Intentional homicides are estimates of unlawful homicides purposely inflicted as a result of domestic disputes, interpersonal violence, violent conflicts over land resources, intergang violence over turf or control, and predatory violence and killing by armed groups. Intentional homicide does not include all intentional killing; the difference is usually in the organization of the killing. Individuals or small groups usually commit homicide, whereas killing in armed conflict is usually committed by fairly cohesive groups of up to several hundred members and is thus usually excluded.

Most crimes in Russia were registered in Moscow, where law enforcement authorities recorded approximately 134,000 offenses in 2023. In the Krasnodar Krai, around 74,500 criminal acts were observed.

This dataset comprises information on reported criminal offences in Russia, both nationally and regionally, expressed in absolute numbers and as rates per 100,000 inhabitants, spanning the period from 2008 to 2023.

The contents of the dataset

Dataset has 12 385 rows and 5 columns. Keys for type of crimes:

• "Murder" - is the intentional causing of death of another person. Article 105 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.
• "Intentional Bodily Harm" - is the intentional infliction of a grave injury, which is hazardous for human life. Article 111 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.
• "Rape" - is a sexual intercourse with the use of violence or of a threat thereof, with respect to the victim or to other persons or with the use of a helpless state of the victim. Article 131 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.
• "Theft" - is the secret larceny of other people's property. Article 158 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.
• "Robbery without violence" - is the open stealing of other people's property. Article 161 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.
• "Robbery with violence" - is assault with the purpose of stealing other people's property, committed with violence which threatens human life and health or with the threat of using such violence. Article 162 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.
• "Extortion" - is the demand that other people's property or their right to property should be transferred, or that other acts of a property nature should be performed under threat of violence or of destruction or damage of other people's property, and also under the threat of dissemination of information that defames the victim or his relatives, or of any other information which may cause substantial harm to the rights or legitimate interests of the victim or his relatives. Article 163 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.
• "Hooliganism" - is a gross violation of the public order manifested in patent contempt of society and attended by the use of weapons or articles used as weapons; or by reason of political, ideological, racial, national or religious hatred. Article 213 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.
• "Crimes in the Sphere of Economic Activity" - are acts that are criminally unlawful, deserving of censure, and socially harmful, which infringe upon the economic order and security of the state, as well as the legally established procedures for the production, distribution, and consumption of tangible goods and other economic assets, as well as exchange. Articles 169-200 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.

Acknowledgements

Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation

Historical dataset showing Russia crime rate per 100K population by year from 1990 to 2021.

In 2021, approximately 3.45 thousand rape and attempted rape crimes were registered in Russia, marking a slight decrease in number compared to the previous year. In 2005, the highest amount of such offenses in the country was recorded at 9.2 thousand cases.

Around 1.9 million crimes were registered by authorities in Russia in 2024, marking a slight decrease compared to the previous year. Over the observed period, the number of offenses recorded in Russia was significantly high at approximately 3.86 million cases in 2006, after which this figure saw a gradual decline.

The most common type of crime committed on streets and in squares and parks of Russia was theft, having occupied 35 percent of the total offenses recorded in these areas in 2023. Road offenses accounted for approximately 22 percent of criminal acts committed outside.

In 2024, over 6,600 criminal offenses committed under drug intoxication were recorded by Russian law enforcement authorities. The number of such incidents has continuously declined since 2016, when offenders in over 28,000 crimes were under the influence of narcotic substances.

This data is provided on a one-time basis from time to time, and is public data that provides crime statistics by region compiled by the National Police Agency as of 2023. Various crime types such as violent crimes, intelligent crimes, theft, and violence are subdivided into city/county/district levels, and for foreign criminals, crime occurrence figures by nationality (such as China, Vietnam, and Russia) are also included. This data can be used to analyze regional crime concentration, crime patterns related to foreigners, and spatial distribution by crime type. This data is used for establishing local security strategies by the police, crime prevention plans in areas with a high concentration of foreigners, space-based crime research by research institutes, and establishment of regional prevention measures by public institutions.

In 2023, 24 people in Russia were convicted for public desecration of Russian military glory with the use of mass media or committed by an organized group. The total number of convictions for crimes committed against mankind in the country equaled 52 in that year.

Since 2015, the number of criminal acts committed in Russia involving the use of firearms, gas weapons, ammunition, explosives, and explosive devices gradually decreased from one year to another, reaching 3.5 thousand crimes in 2021. To compare, at the beginning of the observed period, over five thousand offenses of this type were recorded across the country.

The dataset “Swedish Crime Fiction in Russian Translation: Editions, Corpus and Reviews” contains information about research data related to two different articles about Swedish crime fiction in Russia.

The number of crimes of intended serious harm to health in Russia was measured at around 16,700 in Russia in 2023, which was around three times less than the figure of 2000. Over the observed period, most of such offenses took place in 2005, amounting to 57,900 recorded cases.

In countries like Russia, where legal institutions providing political accountability and protection of property rights are weak, some elite actors accept the use of violence as a tool in political and economic competition. The intensity of this violent exposure may vary depending on the position the province had had in the Soviet administrative hierarchy. The higher the province's position before 1991, the greater the intensity of business violence one is likely to observe there in post-communist times, because the Soviet collapse left a more gaping power vacuum and lack of working informal rules in regions with limited presence of traditional criminal organizations. Post-Soviet entrepreneurs also often find it worthwhile to run for office or financially back certain candidates in order to secure a privileged status and the ability to interpret the law in their favor. Businessmen-candidates themselves and their financial backers behind the scenes may become exposed to competitive pressures resulting in violence during election years, because their competitors may find it hard to secure their position in power through the existing legal or informal non-violent means. To test whether Soviet legacies and Provincial elections indeed cause spikes in commerce-motivated violence, this project relies on an original dataset of more than 6000 attacks involving business interests in 74 regions of Russia, in 1991–2010. The results show that only legislative elections cause increases in violence while there is no firm evidence that executive polls have a similar effect.

In 2023, over 2,300 crimes of a terrorist nature were recorded by law enforcement authorities in Russia, marking an increase from the previous year. This was the highest number of such crimes over the observed period.

In 2024, the number of crimes that were committed using the internet, digital devices, or other telecommunication technologies increased in Russia. The number of technology crimes was the highest over the observed period.

In 2022, over 138,000 crimes were recorded in Moscow, the Russian capital. The number of crimes registered by the city's authorities decreased by approximately 48,000 between 2015 and 2020. Among other federal subjects of the country, Moscow had the highest number of crimes registered each year.