About 30 percent of victims of indecent assaults in Osaka last year were using cellphones, smartphones or portable music players at the time of the attack, Osaka Prefectural Police investigative sources said.
Of some 860 indecent assaults reported in 2012 to the prefectural force, about 14 percent of the victims said they were using mobile or smartphones and another 15 percent said they were listening to music via earphones, the sources said Tuesday.
Among the total cases, 60 percent of the perpetrators snuck up on the victims from behind, 30 percent called out to the victims first and the remaining 10 percent approached them from the front, they said.
"If victims are paying attention to other things when they are assaulted, they may not remember details of the perpetrator," a prefectural police investigator warned.
Osaka police are urging people to use streets where there are many people and where there are street lights.