As of October 24th, St. Thomas-Elgin Crime Stoppers has stopped taking tips. A notice on the chapter’s homepage says it is “temporarily suspending the acceptance of tips until further notice,” and asks people not to send tips by phone, online, or through the P3 app. If a crime is happening or someone is in danger, it says to call 911.
On October 23rd, St. Thomas Police Chief Marc Roskamp announced that the service is pausing its own part in the program “following a cybersecurity breach involving Navigate360’s P3 platform, the third-party system used by Crime Stoppers to receive and manage anonymous tips.” The letter says the platform runs separately from police computer systems.
Where to call instead. In St. Thomas, St. Thomas Police ask people to call them directly at 519-631-1224 with information about a crime or a safety concern. Non-emergency incidents that qualify can also be reported through the police service’s online reporting page. In an emergency, call 911.
The local program also passes tips to Elgin OPP and Aylmer Police, and as of October 24th neither had said publicly whether it has paused its own part in it. Elsewhere in Elgin, the OPP’s non-emergency line is 1-888-310-1122, and Aylmer Police can be reached at 519-773-3144.
The anonymous route is on hold. Its promise was simple: no name, just a code number. The St. Thomas Police letter does not say whether a report made directly to police can stay anonymous, though Chatham-Kent Police, which also paused its part in Crime Stoppers on October 23rd, put it plainly: while it takes reasonable measures to protect personal information, “anonymity cannot be guaranteed when reporting directly to police.”
STPS’s own Crime Stoppers page still lists the old tip lines. Don’t use them until the program reopens.
What is not known yet. No one has said publicly how many St. Thomas-Elgin tips, if any, are in the stolen data. St. Thomas Police say they are seeking verified findings about the impact here, including any risk to people, confidential information and police investigations.
The national picture comes from a CBC News investigation published October 21st. It found that more than 1.5 million tips sent to Canadian Crime Stoppers programs over 25 years were exposed, and that more than 850,000 of them included personal information about tipsters, people named in tips, or Crime Stoppers staff and police. CBC reports the data was stolen in March by a hacker group. Navigate360, the U.S. company that owns P3, said in its own notice on October 23rd that someone copied data from one of its systems between November 21st, 2025 and March 5th, 2026.
If you sent a tip in the past. The head of the Canadian Crime Stoppers Association said Navigate360 told the association that outside experts found the weak spots and fixed them. That protects current and future tips, he said, but the fixes “cannot undo the exposure of information already taken.” Privacy watchdogs have limited power here. The federal privacy commissioner told CBC News the federal private-sector privacy law “generally does not apply” to non-profits like Crime Stoppers chapters, and Ontario’s commissioner said it has no authority to investigate. If you feel unsafe because of a tip you gave, call St. Thomas Police, the OPP or Aylmer Police at the non-emergency numbers above, or 911 if you are in danger.
Chief Roskamp said St. Thomas Police “will reassess our participation once we have the verified findings and security assurances needed to make an informed decision.” He also praised the program, saying Crime Stoppers “and its volunteers have made valuable contributions to the St. Thomas community for decades.”
Earlier coverage: How St. Thomas-Elgin Crime Stoppers Keeps Your Tip Anonymous
Sources: St. Thomas Police Service media release, October 23, 2026 · St. Thomas-Elgin Crime Stoppers notice · CBC News investigation, October 21, 2026
By Anthony Zruna · About the LocVox Newsroom
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