Dark Figure Of Crime

Crimes are legally defined and allow us to measure them; however, for crime to be accurately measured in society, it must be reported or detected first. This is an important factor when crime data is generated and compared. Due to multiple factors not all crimes can be detected by police or reported by victims, thus creating what is known as a dark figure of crime. The ‘dark figure of crime’ is defined as the amount of crime that is undetected, not reported and not recorded (Hayes & Makkai 2015). These figures can result in many people questioning whether official data and statistics from the police, the courts and correctional facilities are accurate.