Logan LaFarniere woke up on an October morning in 2022 to an empty driveway.

His brand-new Ram Rebel truck, which he had purchased a year and a half earlier, was gone. His security camera captured two hooded men breaking into the pickup truck in the dead of night outside his Milton, Ontario, home and driving away with ease.

A few months later, that same truck appeared on a website listing vehicles for sale in Ghana, across the ocean and some 8,500 km away.

“The only thing I noticed was the laptop holder that we had installed in the back of my son’s driver’s seat, and there was some junk in there that he had thrown in there,” LaFerniere told the BBC.

The same junk was also visible in the car ad photos, he said.

“I never had any doubt that it was my vehicle.”

Mr. LaFarniere’s story is hardly unique. In 2022, more than 105,000 cars were stolen in Canada — about one car every five minutes. Among the victims was Canada’s own federal justice minister, whose government-issued Toyota Highlander XLE was stolen by thieves twice.

Early this summer, Interpol placed Canada in the top 10 worst countries for car thefts out of 137 in its database – a “remarkable” achievement, a spokesperson said, considering the country only began integrating its data with the international police organization in February.

According to authorities, once stolen, these cars are either used in other violent crimes, sold to unsuspecting Canadians, or shipped abroad for resale.

According to Interpol, more than 1,500 cars have been stolen from Canada worldwide since February, with an additional 200 cars being identified each week, mostly at ports in other countries.

Auto theft is such an epidemic that it has been declared a “national crisis” by the Insurance Bureau of Canada. According to the bureau, insurers paid out more than C$1.5 billion ($1 billion; £860 million) in auto theft claims last year.

The problem has led police departments across the country to issue public service announcements on how to protect vehicles from theft.

Meanwhile, some Canadians have taken matters into their own hands, installing trackers on their cars and hiring private neighborhood security.

Some people who can afford it have even installed retractable bollards in their driveways – similar to those at banks and embassies – to deter thieves.

Nauman Khan, who lives in Mississauga, a city just outside Toronto, started a bollard installation business after he and his brother were both victims of car thefts.

In one attempt, Mr Khan said, the thieves broke into his home while his wife and young children were asleep. They searched for the keys to his Mercedes GLE parked outside, he said, but ran away after he confronted them.

After that ‘traumatic’ experience they sold their cars, except for two ‘modest’ family cars.

Mr. Khan says he is now hearing similar stories from people in the Toronto area through his company.

“It’s been very busy,” he said. “We had one client whose street had so many home break-ins that he hired a security guard for his house every night because he just didn’t feel safe.”

According to Alexis Piquero, director of the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, it is surprising that auto theft is so prevalent in Canada, given the country’s small population compared to the U.S. and the United Kingdom, which have high rates of this type of crime.

“(Canada) also doesn’t have as many port cities as the US,” Mr. Piquero said.

While the US, Canada and the UK have all seen a spike in car thefts since the Covid-19 pandemic, Canada’s theft rate (262.5 per 100,000 people) is higher than that of England and Wales (220 per 100,000 people), according to the most recent available data from each country.

It’s also fairly consistent with the US, which has about 300 car thefts per 100,000 residents, according to 2022 data.

The increase in recent years has been partly due to a global shortage of cars as a result of the pandemic, which has increased demand for both used and new vehicles.

There is also a growing international market for certain car models, making auto theft a major source of revenue for organized crime groups, said Elliott Silverstein, director of government relations for the Canadian Automobile Association.

According to Silverstein, Canada’s ports are more vulnerable to this type of theft than other countries because of the way they operate.

“In the port system, the emphasis is more on what comes into the country than what leaves the country,” he said, adding that once vehicles are packed into shipping containers at a port, it becomes more difficult to get there.

The police have managed to recover a number of stolen cars.

In October, Toronto police announced an 11-month investigation that 1,080 vehicles worth approximately CAD 60 million recovered. More than 550 charges were filed.

And between mid-December and late March, border and police officials found nearly 600 stolen vehicles at the Port of Montreal after inspecting 400 shipping containers.

However, these types of operations can be difficult to carry out given the volume of goods moving through that port. experts have said. In 2023 alone, approximately 1.7 million containers were transported through the Port of Montreal.

Also, in most cases, port personnel do not have the authority to inspect containers. In customs-controlled areas, only border officials are allowed to open a container without a warrant.

At the same time, the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) is facing chronic staff shortages, according to a report the union submitted to the government in April.

Outdated technology is also a problem.

Patrick Brown, mayor of Brampton, another Ontario city hit hard by car thefts, recently visited the Port Newark Container Terminal in New Jersey to compare inspection tactics between the U.S. and Canada.

He told the National Post newspaper that US authorities “have scanners. They measure density. They work closely with local law enforcement.”

“These are things we don’t do in Canada,” he said.

In May, the Canadian government said it would invest millions to strengthen the CBSA’s ability to search shipping containers. Police will also receive additional funding to combat auto theft in their communities.

But Silverstein says he believes the automakers themselves are the missing piece of the puzzle.

“Everyone is talking about reclaiming vehicles, but my focus has been on why we don’t make the vehicles harder to steal in the first place,” he said.

Meanwhile, car owners like Mr. LaFarniere continue to struggle with how to keep their vehicles safe.

After his Ram Rebel truck was stolen, he replaced it with a Toyota Tundra, a vehicle Mr. LaFarniere described as his “dream truck.”

This time he installed an immobilizer to prevent thieves from easily starting the car. He also fitted it with a tag tracker in case it was stolen and added a stick to the steering wheel for good measure.

Thieves were not deterred. A couple came to Mr. LaFarniere’s driveway, this time to steal the Tundra. They had a harder time, however, breaking the rear window to get inside.

The commotion woke Mr. LaFarniere, who called 911. But the thieves managed to flee in the four minutes it took for police to arrive.

He paid to repair his brand new truck and then sold it.

The whole ordeal, he said, was downright “disheartening.”