October 9, 2025
The rising market value of copper has created powerful economic incentives to target multiple industries’ infrastructure (e.g., public utilities, transportation, etc.) nationwide through criminal acts of theft and vandalism. As previously reported in April 2025, from June to December 2024, more than 5,770 incidents of intentional theft or sabotage targeting communications networks were reported. The updated paper reveals that in the following six months, January to June 2025, reported incidents surged to 9,770 — nearly doubling the prior period. Over a full year, this totals more than 15,540 incidents, underscoring the scale and accelerating pace of the threat. Even modern fiber optic networks and wireless communications towers and equipment, which contain no copper, have been sabotaged in indiscriminate searches for scrap material.
These crimes disrupt essential services, impose millions of dollars in repair costs, and endanger public safety by threatening emergency communications, hospitals, airports, military installations, and other public safety institutions. Fiber cuts and related acts can paralyze critical operations, creating cascading disruptions that may affect millions of citizens simultaneously.
A critical driver of this activity is the ease with which stolen materials and equipment can be sold to scrap metal dealers and resellers, often with limited oversight or accountability. Addressing the demand side of this illicit market is as important as securing the networks themselves. Stronger regulation, tighter transaction requirements, and enhanced enforcement at the state and local levels are urgently needed to reduce the incentive for theft.
In response, communications providers, state governments, law enforcement, and federal lawmakers have taken important steps. States such as Kentucky, Texas, and Minnesota have strengthened critical infrastructure protections and expanded felony classifications for theft and vandalism. Municipal initiatives in Los Angeles and Louisville have led to arrests and recovery of stolen materials. At the federal level, H.R. 2784 — The Stopping the Theft and Destruction of Broadband Act of 2025 — has been introduced to close statutory gaps and criminalize attacks on privately owned communications networks nationwide.
While acknowledging these efforts and the progress achieved in increasing awareness of this growing problem, this paper highlights:
- The scale of theft and vandalism incidents and their economic and safety consequences;
- The greater need for collaboration among the communications industry, the scrap metal industry, state and local jurisdictions, law enforcement and lawmakers;
- The critical role of scrap metal dealers and resellers in enabling these crimes, and the urgent need for stricter oversight and regulation;
- The proactive efforts by communications network providers to protect their assets, as well as recent best practices initiated by state and local governments to help stem the tide of this growing problem;
- Law enforcement’s critical role in recognizing, investigating and prosecuting incidents of intentional theft and damage;
- The need to examine and update existing state statutes to ensure laws are in place or strengthened to penalize intentional theft or vandalism of critical infrastructure, cover all aspects of communications networks, and ensure enhanced penalties are enforced to deter future bad acts