As the freight industry heads into summer, long holiday weekends—like Memorial Day, Independence Day, and Labor Day—bring more than just traffic and time off. They also open the door for a sharp spike in freight fraud.
For bad actors, these weekends offer the perfect storm: reduced staff, delayed response times, fewer eyes on critical transactions, and higher volume of high-value freight moving through the network.
If you're not watching closely, you could come back to work Tuesday morning with a major loss on your hands.
Why Holiday Weekends Attract Fraud:
- Reduced Oversight: Many brokers, shippers, and carriers operate lean over holiday weekends. Fewer eyes and slower responses give fraudsters the window they need to exploit the delays in verification, communication, and issue resolution.
- More Freight, Higher Stakes: Summer inventory—from produce and electronics to outdoor goods are on the road in large quantities. These high-value loads are exactly what cargo thieves are after.
- Fake Identity, Real Consequences: Spoofed emails, stolen MCs, and fraudulent calls let bad actors impersonate carriers and steal loads. With less supervision, fraudulent actors slip through the gaps in standard checks—and disappear with the freight.
Tips to Stay Ahead of Fraud on Long Weekends:
- Trust your instincts—and verify: If something feels off—it probably is. Take the extra step to verify before releasing load details or dispatching a truck.
- Watch for last minute MC hijacks: Fraudsters often manipulate FMCSA records before a scam. Stay alert for sudden changes to carrier contact info, addresses or operating status—especially right before a holiday.
- Know your high-risk window: Fraud activity spikes from Friday afternoon through Monday evening. Increase monitoring during this period for spoofed logins, suspicious tracking or unfamiliar communication.
- Prep your team before the weekend: Brief your ops team on the latest fraud tactics, red flags and how to escalate suspicious activity.
At Highway, we see spikes in fraud around every major holiday. That’s why brokers rely on continuous identity verification and tools like Load Lock+ to secure every load from start to finish.
Don’t Let Your Guard Down
Bad actors count on you being distracted. Long weekends and holidays should be a time for rest—not a window of opportunity for fraud. With the right systems and processes in place, you can stop theft before it starts—and take vacation time with reassurance that you will come back to a fully secure network.
Stay Alert. Stay Protected.
Want to see how top brokerages stop fraud in real-time? Discover how Highway keeps you protected.
