Grand Theft Cargo 🚚

Black Friday is one of the biggest shopping days in the U.S. It kicks off the holiday season shopping when retailers bring in billions. It’s a high-stakes event, and every brand wants a piece of it. Flycatcher Toys, a London-based high-tech toy company, was no different.

They had big plans for the holiday season. In mid-October 2024, the company was to ship 12,600 of their Smart Sketchers — a toy projector that helps kids draw — straight to Walmart’s distribution center in Atlanta. All they had to do was get it out of a North Las Vegas warehouse and drop it off at the Atlanta distribution center.

They hired three trucks for the job. The trucks loaded the shipments and began their journey to Atlanta. 

The operation was simple on paper. Three trucks. One pickup point. One drop-off.

But here’s the twist: the trucks never reached their destination. Instead, two of the shipments were unexpectedly rerouted to Los Angeles. The third truck? It disappeared without a trace. 

This wasn’t a mere delay or logistical error. It was cargo theft — an increasingly common threat in the American supply chain, disrupting it like never before. According to the National Insurance Crime Bureau, cargo theft now costs the logistics and retail industries up to $35 billion annually.

In this issue of CrossDock, we break down what cargo theft is and how it is carried out. We also discuss the evolution of cargo thefts and what is being done to curb them. 

What is Cargo Theft? 

According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), cargo theft includes, but is not limited to, the theft of goods, chattel, money, or baggage that constitute, in whole or in part, a commercial freight shipment moving in commerce.

What is most alarming about cargo theft is that it is far from a random act. Instead, it is a highly organized, market-driven crime. Criminals involved in cargo theft do not simply target anything they encounter; they are keenly aware of which products are in high demand and when those products are most vulnerable to theft.

In short, they know what to steal and when to steal it. 

Add to this the financial impact. According to CargoNet, financial losses from cargo theft in 2024 were $455 million. However, experts believe the real figure is much higher, as many incidents go unreported, either to avoid bad press or because the chances of recovery are slim.

This brings us to the next question: How are cargo thefts executed? Let’s break it down for you. 

What the Truck?

According to the 2024 TT Club–BSI report, physical cargo theft remains the most widespread threat across the U.S. supply chain. In 2024, a staggering 79% of all thefts involved trucks, and 41% of those occurred while shipments were on the move. 

According to experts, most of these thefts aren’t high-speed chases or movie-style heists. Physical cargo thefts are typically carried out at vulnerable points along the route, like rest areas, warehouse lots, or fuel stops, where trucks are left unattended. 

Thieves use simple tools like bolt cutters to break locks, and in some cases, steal the entire truck to offload the goods elsewhere. These operations are often quick, quiet, and well-planned, sometimes aided by GPS jammers or insider tips to avoid detection.

A striking 97% of respondents in the TIA Fraud Report (April 2025) identified truckload freight as the most vulnerable mode to fraud, particularly the full truckload (FTL) operations. 

Case in point: The physical cargo theft played out on May 6, 2022, when thieves stole a truck loaded with $1.5 million worth of Meta’s Oculus VR headsets. 

They had been watching the truck since it left Meta’s distribution center in Louisville, Kentucky, and waited until it stopped at a Pilot rest stop in Haubstadt, Indiana. When the driver stepped away, the thieves moved in, took the entire rig, and disappeared.

Sadly, physical cargo theft isn’t happening on the highway anymore. More and more, organized crews are hitting distribution centers and warehouses. The BSI report notes that 13% of cargo thefts in the U.S. occur at warehouses. And inside jobs, where layout familiarity and access to scheduling data help thieves exploit brief windows when goods are left unguarded or when CCTV coverage lapses. 

So, how are cargo thieves choosing their target?

Cargo Theft 101

“Low risk and high reward” — that’s the calculation cargo thieves make every time they strike. And lately, they’ve been going after electronics. It’s not hard to see why: they’re high in value, small in size, and easy to flip on the black market.

According to Overhaul’s 2024 Annual Cargo Theft Report, electronics accounted for 24% of all stolen goods, with thefts in that category jumping 54% from the previous year.

Right behind electronics are food and beverages. These items accounted for 20% of thefts, especially things like groceries and drinks that can be sold quickly with little trace. Followed by alcohol, pharmaceuticals, and apparel — all items that are either in constant demand or fetch a good price when resold.

Interestingly, cargo thieves don’t just target flashy tech or pharmaceuticals—they also target goods that are suddenly in high demand. 

One of the more unusual examples came in early 2025, when a trailer carrying nearly 100,000 organic eggs vanished from a distribution center in Greencastle, Pennsylvania. With prices soaring due to avian flu egg shortages, the product had become an easy and lucrative target. The truck had been left parked overnight, and by morning, the $40,000 load was gone. 

But it’s not just food. Thieves are also chasing hype. In Arizona, a freight train carrying over $2 million worth of Nike sneakers, including unreleased drops, was hit in a daring heist. The thieves cut the train’s air brake, broke into containers, and disappeared with the goods.

It’s not just about what they’re stealing — it’s where they’re striking. California and Texas continue to be ground zero for cargo theft in the U.S.

According to Overhaul, California accounted for 32% of all cargo thefts in 2024, while Texas followed with 19%. Geographical location, infrastructure, and sheer volume of freight moving through these states made them prime targets. 

Take California, for example, which is home to the nation’s busiest ports — Los Angeles and Long Beach — and has sprawling logistics hubs like the Inland Empire, which handle high-value goods in high volumes. 

Texas, on the other hand, is a crucial cross-border gateway, especially for freight coming in from Mexico. Its extensive highway network and proximity to border towns make it a lucrative target for theft. 

But now, cargo thieves aren’t just sticking to the usual hotspots; they've started to branch out. Cities like Memphis, Dallas, and Atlanta have seen a noticeable uptick in thefts over the past few years, thanks to their growing roles as logistics and intermodal hubs. 

And in a twist straight out of the Wild West, train heists are also making a comeback. According to the Association of American Railroads, the U.S. saw more than 65,000 rail thefts in 2024, a 40% jump from the year before.

However, not all cargo thefts involve cutting locks or hijacking parked trucks; some are executed with fake paperwork and stolen identities. These are referred to as strategic cargo theft.

Silent Heist

In simple terms, strategic theft happens when criminals trick shippers, brokers, or carriers into handing over cargo or money by pretending to be someone they’re not. 

It could be a fake carrier showing up to pick up a load, or a fraudster hacking into a federal database to reroute a shipment. Either way, the result is the same: goods vanish without a trace, and there’s no broken seal or missing GPS ping to show for it.

And this theft is rising alarmingly fast.

In 2020, strategic cargo theft made up just 8% of all cargo theft incidents in the U.S. By the end of 2024, it accounted for about 33%. According to CargoNet, there has been a 1,475% increase in strategic cargo thefts since 2022. 

In an interview with CNBC, CargoNet stated that incidents of strategic cargo theft occurring in the U.S. are linked to criminal groups operating in or connected to more than 32 different countries.

Many of these thefts are part of well-organized international networks that may be planning, funding, or profiting from them, sometimes using them to support broader illegal activities like smuggling or fraud. This highlights how global and coordinated the problem has become.

So what’s the origin of this new theft?

According to experts, the beginning traces back to the post-pandemic freight crisis. In 2021, the cost of moving a container between the U.S. and China nearly increased tenfold. To cut costs, shippers and retailers turned to freight brokers and online load boards, often opting for the lowest bidder instead of known and trusted carriers. 

This decision opened the door to bad actors posing as legitimate trucking companies, exploiting broken relationships, rushed decisions, and weaker security protocols.

In addition, today, cargo thieves are using smarter, more digital tactics to pull off their schemes. They forge documents to set up fake pickups, hack into FMCSA accounts to hijack load assignments, and even buy legitimate-looking motor carrier (MC) numbers online to pose as real trucking companies. 

In some cases, they impersonate dispatchers or double-broker loads to reroute shipments without raising red flags. Some even show up in uniforms or branded trucks to look like the real deal when they arrive to collect the goods.

To better understand this, here’s an example of how a strategic cargo theft works:

So, what’s being done to curb this menace?

End Game

Lawmakers and federal agencies are finally waking up to what the logistics industry has known for years: Cargo theft is no longer a nuisance but a national threat. And now, Washington is stepping in.

In June 2024, the Safeguarding Our Supply Chains Act was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives. The bill proposes the creation of a Supply Chain Crime Coordination Centre within the Department of Homeland Security, bringing together the FBI, Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), and other agencies under a dedicated federal task force.

The goal? To improve coordination, intelligence sharing, and enforcement against cargo theft and supply chain fraud.

More recently, on February 27, 2025, U.S. Senator Todd Young (R-Ind.), Chairman of the Subcommittee on Surface Transportation, Freight, Pipelines, and Safety, convened a hearing aptly titled: “Grand Theft Cargo: Examining the Costly Threat to Consumers and the U.S. Supply Chain.”

The hearing focused on the sharp rise in strategic thefts, brokering scams, and even old-school train robberies. In his opening remarks, Senator Young didn’t mince words:

In response to the surge in thefts, especially those linked to organized retail crime rings, California Congressman David Valadao co-sponsored the Combating Organized Retail Crime Act, a bipartisan effort aimed at cracking down on the networks behind these thefts.

What’s Next?

Yes, cargo theft is a serious problem plaguing the logistics and retail industries, but if left unchecked, its impact will not stop there. Customers will start to feel it too. When goods are stolen, prices increase, and demand for the products spikes. What begins as theft on the road ultimately reaches the checkout counter, making everyday items harder to find and more expensive to purchase.

Experts say solving this won’t just come from catching more thieves. It’ll take real investment, more manpower, dedicated federal prosecutors who can focus on these cases, stronger vetting systems at FMCSA to stop fake carriers before they get access, and tougher penalties that reflect the true scale of the harm. 

Finally, to tackle a crime this complex, it’s going to take more than one agency or one quick fix. It needs the full weight of law enforcement, federal investigators, trucking associations, and the retail industry working together. Cargo theft doesn’t just affect one company — it puts the entire American supply chain at risk. Without real coordination and shared action, the chaos will keep growing, and the cracks in the system will only get wider.

This newsletter was written by Shyam Gowtham

Thank you for reading. We’ll see you at the next edition!