The Iran conflict has thrown the world into a fuel security crisis the likes of which have not been seen since 1970. Around 20% of the world’s oil supply is shipped via the Strait of Hormuz and its chokehold has caused Brent crude to surge. What’s more, analysts have warned that even after hostilities end, the supply disruption could take years to fully unwind given damage to Gulf refinery infrastructure.
The pain for South Africans has been acute and the South African Reserve Bank governor has warned that fuel-price growth could exceed 18% in the second quarter, with the knock-on effect on CPI expected to add two to four percentage points to headline inflation.
The relationship between fuel prices and fuel crime is well established and with the current uncertainty, South African petrol station owners, farmers, and even every-day citizens need to take action.
Drive-offs take their toll on fuel station owners
Petrol station owners deal with drive-offs or bilking on a regular basis. But as fuel security becomes more of an issue, we can expect this crime to spike. In fact, local stations are even considering closing at night in an effort to reduce their risk.
In New Zealand, total fuel drive-off values increased by approximately 78% in 2022 as fuel prices surged, with diesel product loss rising by approximately 110%. Research from the British Oil Security Syndicate, meanwhile, shows that in 2020 drive-offs made up 7.6% of crime per site. This figure has increased to 28.4% in 2024, before the current fuel crisis struck.
South Africa is gearing up for its own surge in this crime with many petrol station owners looking to protect their margins, and their staff, who often face deductions from their salaries as a result of these crimes.
How ANPR works on the forecourt
At its most basic level, a forecourt ANPR system captures the plate of every vehicle that enters the forecourt. Plates are instantly checked against a shared blacklist database of known drive-off offenders. If a match is detected, staff receive an immediate alert, often before the driver reaches a pump.
This technology doesn’t just save the owner from fuel theft, but also helps protect their forecourt retail outlets from theft and hold-ups, many of which turn deadly.
Fuel tanker hijacking – a deadly and often organised crime
Fuel tanker hijacking is one of the most violent and economically damaging forms of fuel theft. In South Africa, the problem is severe by global standards, with research showing the country’s truck hijackings are among the highest in the world according to the 2024 World Metrics report, with roughly 30 to 35 truck hijackings occurring every week.
How ANPR contributes to tanker security
ANPR contributes to tanker security across the entire journey chain, from depot departure to final delivery.
ANPR cameras at depot gates log every vehicle entering and exiting with a timestamped record. Fleet managers can verify that a tanker’s plate matches the authorised vehicle, that the vehicle is not on any watchlist, and that departure and arrival times are consistent with the planned route. ANPR is a foundational technology and it works exceptionally well alongside existing tracking systems. However, these can sometimes get jammed by armed robbers. In these instances, ANPR on national routes means trucks can still be traced.
Any anomaly, such as a route deviation, or a different vehicle using a tanker’s authorisation codes is immediately flagged.
ANPR is not limited to fixed sites. A national footprint of ANPR cameras, including those deployed by private security companies, municipalities, and traffic authorities, create a distributed tracking network that can follow a tanker’s progress along its route.
Fuel siphoning – a street-level crime on the rise
While large-scale fuel theft attracts the most attention, the siphoning of petrol and diesel from privately owned vehicles parked on public streets is a growing phenomenon directly tied to fuel price escalation.
As the fuel crisis deepened in early 2026, Australian and UK media reported that thieves were systematically targeting parked cars, prising open fuel caps and siphoning tanks dry overnight – not only resulting in the loss of fuel, but also causing damage to the car.
In South Africa, the pattern is consistent with broader vehicle crime trends. With organised crime networks well established, fuel siphoning represents one of the lower-risk options for criminal activity. It is difficult to prosecute, easy to execute, and increasingly profitable as fuel prices rise. The cost-of-living pressure also means both opportunistic individuals and organised groups are expanding into street-level fuel theft.
ANPR application for street siphoning
A nationwide footprint of ANPR cameras is steadily being bolstered by security companies, and even some neighbourhood watches, operating covert mobile units with ANPR capabilities. This allows a wide net of patrols where plates are scanned in real time against stolen vehicle registries and crime watchlists.
NAVIC’s network architecture means that a vehicle involved in a siphoning incident in one area is immediately flagged across the entire platform. Response teams in adjacent areas can be pre-alerted if the same vehicle is seen moving between neighbourhoods, enabling interception before the criminal has finished their operation.
Diesel theft on farms – a growing crisis for local agriculture
On-farm diesel theft is widespread across South Africa, with diesel siphoned from tractors, combine harvesters, bowsers, and static storage tanks at farms across the country.
The financial impact is substantial and cumulative. Individually, thefts of 20 to 40 litres per transaction may seem modest, but the aggregate losses across a farming operation (and the compounding effect of multiple incidents) are enormous. Diesel theft from farms costs South African agriculture millions of rands annually, with the economic impact compounded by the difficulty of attribution when small volumes are stolen repeatedly.
As farmers struggle to deliver crops in the wake of a global fertilizer shortage, (also thanks to the Iranian conflict), any further financial hits could prove catastrophic.
ANPR and farm security
The first step is to deploy ANPR cameras at all vehicle access points to a farm. Every vehicle entering and leaving is logged with a timestamp. Authorised vehicles such as family members, suppliers, contractors, and farm workers are whitelisted. Any unrecognised vehicle triggering an after-hours or unscheduled access alert is immediately flagged to farm security or management. And vehicles without plates are flagged 24/7.
For added security, the NAVIC platform can also set Time Based Alerts. This means farmers will get alerted if any vehicle triggers a camera outside of set times, such as between 10pm and 5am.
This is especially valuable because organised diesel theft typically requires vehicles to enter farm property, whether to reach a static tank, a parked tractor, or a storage bowser. Gating this access with ANPR removes the anonymity that makes the crime so attractive in the first place.
Even if a theft is not prevented in real time, ANPR provides a forensic record that enables prosecution and insurance claims.
In fact, South African farmers have expressed frustration at the lack of attention to diesel theft as a criminal priority. ANPR provides the evidentiary infrastructure to change this dynamic and constitutes actionable evidence that makes prosecution feasible.
Why vehicle intelligence is the unifying solution
Across all four theft categories, ANPR provides a set of capabilities that no other single technology can match:
Pre-crime deterrence: Known offenders are identified before they can act, not after
Real-time alerting: Control rooms and security personnel receive actionable intelligence in seconds, not hours
Network intelligence: Every plate read contributes to a shared intelligence picture across the entire platform, benefiting all participants
Forensic evidence: Timestamped, camera-matched plate reads create prosecution-grade evidence trails
We know South Africa is particularly exposed. With diesel prices already at record highs, a weakening rand, shrinking law enforcement capacity, and organised crime networks that have demonstrated the ability to rapidly adapt to new criminal opportunities, the need to implement robust ANPR-based security is now urgent.
NAVIC’s ANPR vehicle intelligence platform addresses all four theft vectors through a single, integrated, cloud-based system. Whether the threat is a known drive-off offender approaching a forecourt pump, a hijacked tanker deviating from its route, a suspicious vehicle circling a residential neighbourhood with a set of fuel hoses in the boot, or an unrecognised bakkie entering a vulnerable and isolated farm at 2am, ANPR is the technology that sees it first.