Los Cabos Ranked As Third Safest City In Mexico

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Last Updated 2 years ago

Los Cabos is usually ranked as one of the safest cities in Mexico. In the latest update to the ranking published by INEGI, the federal institution in charge of statistics and geography in Mexico, Los Cabos came in at number 3. The ranking contemplates the opinions of locals and tourists in many of the main Mexican cities. It’s known as the security perception ranking by INEGI.

In the most recent update to the ranking, the local “perception of security” grew by about 4%. Back in June, when INEGI had last updated the ranking, only 69% of the people polled in Los Cabos had indicated that they felt safe in the region. The latest polls that were taken in September indicate that 73% of people in Los Cabos feel safe in the area. 

What Has Contributed To The Uptick In This Sense of Security?       

There are a couple of things that could’ve contributed to this rise in the sense of security that Cabo locals and tourists reported. One of the big factors could be the actual drop in the number of crime-related incidents reported in Los Cabos over the last year. For example, fraud, a crime that tends to affect tourists in places like Los Cabos, has dropped significantly over the last year.

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In 2021 over 1,000 incidents of fraud had been reported to local authorities by this time last year. February and October are typically peak months for tourism in Los Cabos, and they were the two months with the most instances of fraud. While we don’t have the full numbers for October 2022 yet for obvious reasons, less than 800 fraud cases have been brought before authorities in the first 9 months of the year.

According to local authorities, another element that could’ve contributed to this uptick in the sense of security are the different programs that they’ve put in place to help locals and tourists contact authorities in case of an emergency. While anyone in Los Cabos should be able to contact the authorities by dialing 9-1-1, authorities have launched programs to allow particularly teens to contact them via WhatsApp. 

The program is called  “Whatsappeando por tu Seguridad.” It literally consists of local WhatsApp groups that are monitored by police in which people in the community can report crimes as they are being committed. While this initiative doesn’t necessarily help tourists in the region, it has helped local communities feel safer, and locals make up the bulk of those questioned by INEGI workers, which made Los Cabos the third-safest city in Mexico.

How Is This Ranking Updated?      

For those questioning the validity of the rankings, INEGI has mentioned that they use different metrics to ultimately come up with the percentages that they present in their rankings. These lists are updated every three months. INEGI workers either call or are actually on the ground asking people questions about their sense of security within a city. People who are polled for the rankings are asked to state their fear of being robbed on a scale of one to ten. 

Also, the survey directly questions those polled if they had witnessed a crime in the last 3 months to a year. As previously stated, most of the people questioned are locals. However, in cities like Los Cabos, INEGI workers have been known to question tourists. This helps them get a better grasp of the perception of security in different parts of the city. While it’s encouraging that people feel safe in Los Cabos, U.S. Ambassador Ken Salazar still warns tourists to be cautious while in Los Cabos. Particularly when going to areas outside the main tourist zones at night.