• With soaring commodity prices, copper cable thefts are skyrocketing.

  • The Orange network is particularly targeted by thieves.

  • In Brittany alone, 66 thefts of copper cables have been counted since the beginning of the year, depriving nearly 6,230 telephone and Internet customers.

The phenomenon is not new.

But with the soaring prices of raw materials, copper cable thefts have been exploding for several months all over France.

At 7,500 euros per ton, the metal indeed arouses the greed of organized gangs who grab everything in their path.

The scourge spares no one, small or large companies.

If the SNCF is particularly targeted, the Orange network is also regularly targeted.

In Brittany alone, 66 copper cable thefts have been counted since the start of the year, twice as many as in 2019. In nine months, burglars, who often operate at night and in rural areas , amassed a colossal booty in the region by stealing more than 24 kilometers of cables, or about 37 tons of copper.

In the aftermath, the metal is then melted down and then resold on the black market.

"We are really dealing with very professional teams who leave nothing to chance", indicates Jean-Marc Escalettes, director of Orange in the Great West.

Outages that sometimes last several weeks

For the operator, which historically manages the entire copper network in France, the financial loss is of course very significant, of the order of “several million euros”.

But these thefts also affect its customers.

In 2022 alone, more than 6,230 Breton households were deprived of telephone and / or Internet because of these thefts.

And the outage can sometimes last several days or even weeks.

“It's very complex to repair a copper cable, it's much easier to remove it than to put it back on,” assures Jean-Marc Escalettes.

Even if they do not manage the copper network, which they rent from Orange, the other telephone operators also suffer the consequences of these thefts.

“In the end, it is our customers who find themselves deprived of services, underlines Franck Coudrieau, regional delegate for Altice (SFR) in the West.

We are therefore all impacted and united”.

Faced with this scourge, Orange has strengthened its collaboration with the police, which sometimes manage to get their hands on gangs of thieves.

The operator is also testing new devices such as the installation of sensors on the cast iron hatches that burglars lift to get their hands on the goods.

“We will see if there are suspicious movements on these hatches in order to be able to intervene as quickly as possible, indicates Jean-Marc Escalettes.

Because only in flagrante delicto can burglars be arrested.

As soon as the copper cables are stolen, it is already too late”.

Miscellaneous facts

Val-de-Marne: Seven tons of copper stolen from an RATP warehouse in Sucy-en-Brie

Miscellaneous facts

Marne: An entire town deprived of telephone and Internet due to a breakdown

  • Flight

  • Heist

  • Copper

  • Metal

  • Orange

  • Telecom operators

  • Brittany

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