Extortion doesn't move the same way across the country: the map of the biggest drops and increases
While Amazonas and Guainía cut extortion by more than 40%, departments like Atlántico and Chocó saw it surge: evidence of a crime that relocates rather than disappears.
The national extortion picture hides very different dynamics at the department level. Compared to the previous government, the ten largest reductions were recorded in Amazonas (-68.8%), Guainía (-41.9%), Córdoba (-37.2%), San Andrés (-34.5%), Arauca (-26.9%), Putumayo (-19.4%), Boyacá (-6.0%), and Nariño (-3.2%); Caldas (+8.0%) and Valle del Cauca (+13.2%) close out that list with the smallest increases in the country.
At the other end, some departments show considerable increases: Atlántico (+532.8%), Chocó (+120.2%), Cesar (+101.6%), Magdalena (+96.5%), Bolívar (+89.8%), Huila (+82.4%), Norte de Santander (+73.5%), Santander (+73.4%), Sucre (+70.0%), and Quindío (+68.1%) top the list of largest increases.
We read this as evidence that extortion is shifting territorially: when the business is shut down in one area, criminal groups look to move it elsewhere. It's a pattern reinforced by the crime's increasingly digital component: extortion attempts that originate from prisons and don't depend on a criminal structure's physical presence in the victim's territory.
That dynamic is precisely why we insist the fight against extortion can't rely on a single national strategy: it requires ongoing, department-by-department monitoring, and constant coordination among the National Police, the Ministry of the Interior, and other State agencies to tackle both traditional extortion and its digital variant.
