The aim of the paper is twofold. First, we show that a quantum field theory A living on the line and having a group G of inner symmetries gives rise to a category G − LocA of twisted representations. This category is a braided crossed G-category in the sense of Turaev [60]. Its degree zero subcategory is braided and equivalent to the usual representation category Rep A. Combining this with [29], where Rep A was proven to be modular for a nice class of rational conformal models, and with the construction of invariants of G-manifolds in [60], we obtain an equivariant version of the following chain of constructions: Rational CFT ❀ modular category ❀ 3-manifold invariant.Secondly, we study the relation between G−LocA and the braided (in the usual sense) representation category Rep A G of the orbifold theory A G . We prove the equivalence Rep A G ≃ (G−LocA) G , which is a rigorous implementation of the insight that one needs to take the twisted representations of A into account in order to determine Rep A G . In the opposite direction we have G− LocA ≃ Rep A G ⋊ S, where S ⊂ Rep A G is the full subcategory of representations of A G contained in the vacuum representation of A, and ⋊ refers to the Galois extensions of braided tensor categories of [44,48].Under the assumptions that A is completely rational and G is finite we prove that A has g-twisted representations for every g ∈ G and that the sum over the squared dimensions of the simple g-twisted representations for fixed g equals dim Rep A. In the holomorphic case (where Rep A ≃ Vect C ) this allows to classify the possible categories G−LocA and to clarify the rôle of the twisted quantum doubles D ω (G) in this context, as will be done in a sequel. We conclude with some remarks on non-holomorphic orbifolds and surprising counterexamples concerning permutation orbifolds. * Supported by NWO.