Overview
- Bell logged 993 incidents of copper theft and vandalism between January and June 2026, a 78 per cent increase from the same period last year.
- Ontario and New Brunswick account for about 85 per cent of the rise, with Ontario reporting 579 cases concentrated in Hamilton, Niagara and Milton.
- New Brunswick recorded a 235 per cent jump in thefts and Quebec saw an 89 per cent increase, putting small and rural communities at higher risk of service loss.
- Bell says arrests tied to copper thefts rose about 32 per cent in the first half of 2026, Quebec police made 150 per cent more arrests locally, and the company has won civil judgments against some thieves.
- Carriers are installing alarms linked to police, increasing surveillance, filing civil suits, running an outage tracking website and accelerating a move from copper to fibre, but companies say coordinated action with governments and metal recyclers is still needed.