Forty percent of U.S. supply chain loss-prevention leaders reported annual cargo theft losses of at least $1 million, with 28% losing more than $2 million in the past year, according to a Cargo Theft Report from SmartSense by Digi released this week.

The survey of 150 U.S.-based loss and organized retail crime prevention leaders found that 81% of respondents said cargo theft has become more organized in recent years. Seventy-nine percent said their organization is more concerned about cargo theft today than ever before. More than 60% reported cargo theft incidents have increased compared to last year.

What tactics are thieves using?

Respondents identified four primary theft methods driving losses across U.S. road freight:

• Fraudulent pickups and carrier impersonation: 78%
• GPS jamming and spoofing: 71%
• Trailer theft: 66%
• Double brokering: 64%

The data points to a sharp shift toward cyber-enabled theft, with criminal networks exploiting digital vulnerabilities in carrier and broker systems alongside physical attacks on trailers and loads.

How is the threat hurting the bottom line?

Cargo theft is cutting directly into top-line revenue. Eighty percent of respondents said incidents have led to lost sales for their organization. Eighty-one percent also flagged organized retail crime as a growing concern, tying cargo theft to a broader retail loss-prevention mandate.

What are shippers buying to fight back?

Seventy percent of respondents said their organizations are investing more this year in cargo theft prevention compared to last year. Buyers are prioritizing real-time location visibility and analytics that can flag recurring theft patterns or high-risk lanes, according to the SmartSense researchers.

Procurement teams are shifting toward solutions that combine GPS telemetry with pattern-recognition software capable of flagging anomalies against historical lane performance.

"Cargo thieves have continued to escalate their tactics and expand their use of technology," Guy Yehiav, president of SmartSense by Digi, said. "Businesses need to evolve with it. New forms of instantaneous location tracking and visibility intelligence are needed to understand what normal movement looks like, identify anomalies quickly and act before suspicious activity turns into a multimillion-dollar loss."

Why is cargo theft now a cybersecurity problem?

Scott Glenn, vice president of asset protection at The Home Depot, drew a direct line between logistics data and load security.

"Cargo theft is increasingly a cybersecurity issue as much as it is a physical security issue," Glenn said.

"If criminals gain access to transportation or logistics systems, they can potentially identify what is being shipped, where it is going and when it will be there. That intelligence can turn a shipment into a very specific target."

Carriers, brokers and shippers must treat load data with the same sensitivity as the freight itself, Glenn added. Respondents said they are tracking fraud signals across load boards and carrier-vetting platforms, where criminal networks have moved to impersonate legitimate motor carriers.

How big could the real problem be?

Just 37% of respondents said they regularly report incidents and work directly with law enforcement on investigations. Underreporting suggests the true scale of cargo theft in the United States likely exceeds published industry figures — which already rank domestic freight theft among the highest in North America by value lost per incident.

The report stressed that technology alone is insufficient. Faster coordination and response when incidents occur remain critical gaps, the researchers said.

SmartSense by Digi, a business unit of Digi International, provides IoT-based asset tracking, monitoring, and process digitization solutions. With 70% of respondents planning increased investment and only a third maintaining consistent law-enforcement engagement, the market for visibility platforms, telematics, and carrier-vetting tools is positioned for sustained growth through 2026.