Fraudulent email attempts increased 117% year-over-year as theft tactics shift toward identity and authorization gaps, according to Highway’s Q4 2025 Freight Fraud Index. By year-end, direct thefts accounted for nearly half of reported stolen loads, increasingly tied to carriers with legitimate operating histories, real equipment and familiarity with broker and shipper workflows.
“Direct theft is the hardest to combat because these carriers were once trusted. There’s no crystal ball to predict when someone with a clean history is going to break bad, and we’re seeing the same playbook show up across channels. In 2025, Highway blocked 1,986,995 fraudulent email attempts, up 117% from 914,719 in 2024, flagged and blocked 8,525,962 fraudulent phone numbers, and issued 9,129 identity alerts across our network,” says Michael Grace, VP of risk at Highway.
Key takeaways:
· The analysis highlights three primary fraud vectors affecting brokers and their carrier networks: direct theft (carrier-involved theft), compromised inboxes and manipulated identities, including ownership changes or “sold MC” scenarios.
· A late 2025 emerging trend is when a load is picked up legitimately, then compromised mid-transit through spoofed calls or lookalike-domain emails that request a reroute to a fraudulent drop location.
· Among the most targeted commodities in the analysis were food and beverage, electronics, copper, protein powder and cosmetics. The report also points to California, New York, Illinois, Texas, and Indiana, as key areas of activity.
