Toronto crime tips org freezes operations after details of data breach come to light

A Toronto crime prevention program that long promised witnesses a safe space to anonymously report tips froze its operations late Wednesday night, hours after a Canadian news outlet reported that more than 1.5 million tips from Crime Stoppers chapters across the country were exposed in a data breach.

Crime Stoppers urges people not to provide their names when submitting information, but reporters at Canada’s CBC broadcaster were able to reach more than a dozen tipsters by reviewing the hacked data made available to them in March by Distributed Denial of Secrets (DDoSecrets). 

About half of the 1.5 million leaked tips CBC studied — some dating back 25 years — contained personal information, the outlet reported.

While Canadian Crime Stoppers Association and individual chapters, including Toronto’s, had confirmed the breach in the days after the hack, they offered no detail about what was exposed, blaming the lack of information on vendor Navigate360 and its subsidiary, P3 Global Intel.

But late Wednesday night the Toronto chapter broke ranks with the national association, revealing a timeline showing what it knew and when along with an announcement that it will pause operations.

“Since 1984, people in Toronto have come to Toronto Crime Stoppers because we promised they could stay anonymous,” Sean Sportun, chair of Toronto Crime Stoppers, said in a statement. “This week’s reporting shows that for some of them, that promise was broken. We are deeply sorry.”

The Toronto organization said it has directed Navigate360 to immediately stop taking tips and no longer process any new information. It also has told Canada’s National Anonymous Call Centre to stop receiving and processing tips meant for Toronto Crime Stoppers, according to the statement.

“Until we have a safer way to protect you, please do not send us tips by phone, online, or through the app,” the statement said.

The organization is looking for a way to take tips on a truly anonymous basis, it said.

“For more than 40 years, people in Toronto have relied on Crime Stoppers to share what they know without giving their name: a witness afraid of retaliation, a neighbour who can’t be seen talking to police, someone reporting a person close to them,” the statement said. 

“Their courage has helped solve crimes, prevent tragedies, and save lives. Pausing our program means that option isn’t available now, and we did not make this decision lightly. We are pausing because those people deserve a system we can fully stand behind.”

Canadian Crime Stoppers Association and Navigate360 did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Navigate360 told Toronto Crime Stoppers that the stolen data contained 176,859 Toronto tips, which were reported between January 2022 and November 2025, the Toronto chapter’s statement said. The vendor also told Toronto Crime Stoppers that it had found 14,973 names in those tips, but could not say if the names belonged to tipsters, suspects or both.

Toronto Crime Stoppers has made “numerous requests” through their lawyers for the text of the stolen tips, but Navigate360 has not responded, the statement said. 

“Since March, Navigate360 has told us repeatedly that P3 is secure,” the statement said. “In April, it told us Toronto’s data had not been taken. When it told us in June that Toronto’s data was affected, it didn’t say what was exposed.”

A hacktivist collective known as Internet Yiff Machine took responsibility for the March breach, saying its goal was to prove that Navigate360 and P3 Global Intel lied about their capabilities.