Copper Cable Theft Attempt Knocks Out Orange Service for Up to 40,000 Customers in Western France

A botched copper cable theft in western France left as many as 40,000 Orange customers without reliable phone or internet service over a two-day stretch, an outage officials say wasn’t a glitch, but a crime.

The disruption hit the Morbihan department in Brittany, a largely rural area about a three-hour drive west of Paris. Between May 26 and May 27, residents and businesses reported dead zones, failed calls, spotty mobile data, and home internet lines that simply went dark.

How big was the outage?

Local authorities, the prefecture, which represents France’s national government at the regional level, estimated the impact at up to 25,000 mobile customers and 15,000 fixed-line customers.

The hardest-hit communities were clustered in central and eastern Morbihan, including Ploërmel, Josselin, Guer, Campénéac, and Mauron. For people on the ground, it wasn’t just slow loading speeds. In many places, service was unavailable altogether.

When mobile networks wobble, everyday tasks start failing fast: text messages don’t go through, two-factor authentication codes never arrive, and app-based payments can become a coin flip. When fixed internet drops at the same time, the usual backup, switching to home Wi‑Fi or tethering, may not exist.

Authorities’ message: if you can’t reach emergency services, go in person

Officials also pushed a blunt piece of guidance: if you can’t get through to emergency services by phone, go directly to the nearest fire and rescue station.

It’s a reminder of how quickly a telecom outage can turn into a public-safety problem, especially in smaller towns where the nearest station may be several miles away.

Orange blames a copper cable theft attempt

Orange, France’s largest telecom provider (roughly comparable to AT&T or Verizon in market footprint), said the outage was triggered by an attempted theft of copper cables near Ploërmel.

Even an “unsuccessful” theft can cause major damage. Cutting or yanking cables can cripple a key segment of the network, forcing crews to secure the site, replace hardware, and test connections, work that can’t be fixed with a remote reset.

Copper remains a target because it can be resold, even as many areas transition to fiber. Orange said it planned to file a criminal complaint.

Service mostly restored, but thousands still without landlines

By May 27, officials said service was gradually returning, with about 90% to 95% of customers back online for mobile and fixed connections.

But roughly 2,000 customers were still without fixed-line service, often the group that feels the outage most sharply, especially households relying on internet-based calling and small businesses running card terminals or phone systems over IP.

Why it mattered: payments, deliveries, appointments, and basic communication

Across the affected towns, the outage showed up in small, grinding ways: a contractor missing new calls, a family unable to reach a doctor, a student losing a video class, a shop reverting to cash when electronic payments became unreliable.

Businesses and residents scrambled for workarounds, borrowing a phone on another carrier, driving to find a working connection, or leaning on a neighbor’s Wi‑Fi if it happened to be up.

A repeat warning sign for the region

The Morbihan outage also followed a major disruption in early December 2025 around Pontivy, another local hub, when officials said about 9,900 users were affected, including 249 businesses.

The causes were different, December’s incident was described as a structural network failure, while May’s outage was tied to criminal damage, but the takeaway was the same: modern life in rural areas still depends on vulnerable, sometimes aging infrastructure. And when a critical link breaks, entire communities can lose their digital lifeline in minutes.