In some localities and for some time periods, you are more likely to be a victim of homicide as a taxi driver than as a police officer or security guard (in other localities and time periods, policing is usually more deadly). In terms of non-fatal assaults, taxi drivers are right up there with police officers and security guards. The NIOSH and the US Department of Health and Human Services, and Department of Labor, have studies of this going back to the 1990s (https://www.taxi-library.org/oshataxi.pdf ).

Taxi drivers make easy crime targets for a number of reasons. They carry cash, they can be lured to virtually any remote (or easy to escape) location, they are working alone, they are working late at night.

Between 1992 and 1997, at least 50 cab drivers were murdered each year while at work. There may or may not be a recent surge in a specific location, but it has been a dangerous profession for a long time.