Copper theft may not be the most glamorous crime in the world, but it is big business. It has grown to become a “multi-billion problem worldwide”, said Terry Goldsworthy, associate professor in criminal justice and criminology at Bond University, on The Conversation.
Metal theft is nothing new, but it’s “on the rise, largely linked to soaring commodity prices”, said tech site Wired. This is especially true for copper, “a crucial component in everything from solar panels to electric vehicles, and computer chips to plumbing parts”, said business site The Logic.
Having crashed nearly a decade ago due to factors including a Chinese ban on scrap imports, its price has steadily risen since the pandemic and copper is now roughly 30% more expensive than it was five years ago. This makes it a “more attractive target for criminals looking for a quick profit”, according to Goldsworthy.
A key target in recent years has been copper cabling, even if “the disruption caused is often totally disproportionate to the face value of the stolen material”, added Wired. These are the “conduits that keep people connected, the infrastructure that civilisation depends on” and “as the world electrifies”, this form of theft is getting “ever more serious”.
The problem, according to The Logic, is that stopping copper theft “is a little like playing Whac-a-Mole”. That is why some forces have turned to predictive policing, using analytics to try to guess where metal thieves will strike next. Todd Foreman, director of law enforcement outreach at the Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries, uses data analysis to help criminologists anticipate future hot spots of metal-related crime. | 
