January: Recoveries, trends and tips from
Global Telemetrics
January is finally over, after what seemed like 3 months rolled into one! As we look ahead to February, our Winter Olympics teams will be throwing themselves down the ice and snow in the quest for glory..
For thieves in January, their attempts at stealing vehicles slid out of control as Global Telemetrics recovered £7.1m worth of vehicles, including a major chop shop bust with 25 vehicles recovered. This now puts our overall total value of vehicles recovered to over £217m.
January Recovery Highlights
Most recovered vehicle: BMW took the top spot for the beginning of 2026, with the BMW X5 being the most popular vehicle for thieves in January. Other models stolen included M2s and M5s
Other vehicles recovered include:
- Aston Martin DB6
- Audis including the RSQ8 and more
- Motorhomes including Fiat Ducato, Ford Transit and Chaussons
- Ford Fiesta
- Land Rover including Discovery, Range Rover Sport and Range Rover Vogue
- Lexus RX 350H and 450H
- McLaren 720S and a range of other high end vehicles spoken about below
Supercars being targeted
In our annual recovery round up for 2025, Lamborghini and Porsche featured in our top 10 recovered vehicles for the year. Early 2026 has continued this trend with models of both vehicles being stolen throughout January. Lamborghini Urus’ are consistently targeted, with a number of these vehicles being recovered by our team. 911’s and Taycan’s were the most recovered models of Porsche within January.
Chop Shop Stopped
Last year a number of chop shops were identified and stopped thanks to the amazing collaborative work of our Secure Control Centre and Repatriations Team. Multiple vehicles were recovered for not only our customers but also owners of cars who did not have trackers, leading to arrests being made around the country.
This year has begun in the same manner, with a major chop shop operation successfully shut down towards the middle of the month. Our Repatriations Team were hunting down a Porsche Taycan stolen from one of our finance company partners. The wireless tracking devices, covertly hidden inside the vehicle, lead our team to the chop shop, located in the Northamptonshire area. Police quickly arrived on the scene arresting 4 people, and 25 vehicles were recovered.
Quickest Recovery.
The quickest recovery of the month was in fact the last recovery of the month. On the 31st January, a customer’s BMW M5 was stolen during a burglary where keys were taken. Armed with the whereabouts of the M5 from his GTE Track app, our customer informed the police of the location. Police arrived at the scene but struggled to find the vehicle.
Our Repatriations Team was deployed just 12 minutes after the theft was reported, and they quickly joined the search and located the stolen vehicle..
Hotspots
Every year we document where vehicles are being stolen from. Year on year London has been the leading hotspot. 29% of all vehicles recovered this month were stolen from a London borough, Barnet being the most popular. Securing second place once more, the West Midlands maintains its historical position, while South Yorkshire claims third place for the month.
Introducing a third option to our Driver Detection methods
Our well renowned and innovative Driver Detection methods will be having a new addition joining them in February.
On February 9th, we will be introducing the Driver Detection Tag, a convenient alternative to the Driver detection Card. The Tag is designed for the customer who doesn’t carry a wallet and will now sit in our product catalogue alongside the card and our mobile phone D-iD method,(available via our GTE Track app).
You can find out more about the card and its operation here.
