[ INSIGHT ] SCSECURITY
by Andrew Wimer Senior Director, Operations & Professional Services, Descartes descartesawimer@descartes.com | 519-883-4435
Freight Fraud: 5 Ways to Mitigate Risk Freight fraud is becoming increasingly commonplace across the U.S. supply chain. In fact, 72% of respondents to a 2024 Transportation Intermediaries Association survey experienced at least three different types of fraud—everything from phishing and brokerage scams to cyberattacks, and fraudulent inbound phone calls and text messages.
auto-reject carriers that fail validation, and sort callers to enable you to cherry pick which carriers you speak to. Similar email tools can automatically identify email addresses impersonating real carriers to reduce risk of fraudulent transactions, while ensuring carriers are compliant and in-network. 4. Enhance pre-tender visibility with deep insights into a carrier’s history, assets, and reliability before tendering a load. For example, advanced technology can quickly highlight any red flags around lane history, VIN validation, insurance, ELD equipment validation, or safety records. Granular data at the carrier and driver level—e.g., how many loads a carrier/driver has tracked over the past six months to determine if it meets a set threshold—enables management by risk exception. 5. Leverage post-tender execution performance evaluation. Lane-level performance metrics, such as tracking compliance, transit time, and on-time performance, help inform future carrier vetting decisions to minimize fraud risk. As the threat of freight fraud escalates, shippers and brokers can protect their supply chains—and expand carrier capacity without exponentially expanding risk—by adopting sophisticated data-led fraud prevention strategies to optimize carrier vetting, enhance brand reputation, and protect margins. n
logistics leaders are turning to technology that leverages sophisticated algorithms and advanced data integrity checks, evaluating billions of location and event data points to highlight potential fraud and detect suspicious behavior and unauthorized data sources. These five steps will optimize your tech stack to protect your organization from the risk of freight fraud: 1. Employ two-factor authentication (2FA) across your platform. Add an extra layer of security to prevent hacks. 2. Prevent data spoofing. Monitor and validate carrier activity with geolocation data and image verification technology, particularly for vehicle information number (VIN). You can quickly validate whether the VIN belongs to the carrier, ensure the truck picking up a load is the expected vehicle, and confirm the driver is on site based on delivery photo metadata. 3. Extend fraud monitoring into telecom and email workflows. Save time and reduce risk with tech tools that verify inbound calls before you answer,
Perhaps you’ve received a phishing attempt from someone impersonating FMCSA, urging you to click on a fake link to update your company info. Or perhaps, as highlighted in the testimony at a recent U.S. Senate Subcommittee hearing examining the growing threat of cargo theft, your company has experienced the misfortune of identity theft, e.g., bad actors impersonating reputable carriers to broker loads to unsuspecting carriers who deliver the cargo while criminal organizations pocket the money. You’re not alone. As bad actors become more sophisticated and backed by substantial financial resources, shippers, third-party logistics providers, and brokers need to bolster their fraud prevention strategies with investment in advanced technology and systems to monitor and verify carrier legitimacy—both pre- and post- tender—including advanced verification processes, real-time tracking systems, and artificial intelligence to identify and flag suspicious activity. Forward-thinking supply chain and
24 Inbound Logistics • June 2025
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