Cargo Theft Statistics 2026: Losses, Top States and Most Stolen Cargo

Last updated: November 6, 2026, with Verisk CargoNet’s Q3 2026 analysis. Next update: when CargoNet publishes its full-year 2026 figures. Its 2025 full-year analysis came out on January 21, 2026.

This page tracks cargo theft statistics as each new report is published. The quarterly table grows with each release, each figure carries its source, and the update log at the bottom records what changed and when. The main source is Verisk CargoNet, whose headline figures combine the US and Canada. A second dataset from Overhaul covers the US only and counts incidents differently, so it is shown separately.

What changed in the Q3 2026 report

CargoNet released its third-quarter analysis on November 4, 2026, covering reports received through October 23. Incidents fell faster than in Q2, while the growth in losses slowed: Q2 losses had more than doubled year over year, and Q3 losses rose 12 percent.

• Incidents: 547 supply chain crime incidents, down 33 percent year over year and 19 percent from Q2.
• Losses: an estimated $230.1 million, up from $205.1 million in Q3 2025.
• Million-dollar thefts more than doubled: 19 thefts with documented values of $1 million or more, against 9 a year earlier, with many involving high-value electronics and data center materials.
• Fictitious pickups fell far less than thefts overall: 138 against 147, a 6 percent decline set against a 33 percent drop in all incidents, so their share rose from 18 percent to roughly 25 percent.
• Average value: $448,456 per documented theft from January through September, 72 percent above the same period of 2025 ($261,115).

Keith Lewis, vice president of operations at Verisk CargoNet, put the Q2 result this way: “Lower incident volume should not be mistaken for lower risk.” The Q3 numbers point the same direction.

Quarter-by-quarter cargo theft tracker

Each row is one CargoNet release, shown as first reported. New quarters are added as they are published.

Two notes on reading the table. First, CargoNet’s labels vary between releases (“events” in Q1, “theft incidents” in Q2, “supply chain crime incidents” in Q3), and all are broader than confirmed thefts, so compare each quarter with its own year-earlier figure rather than with its neighbor. Second, the quarterly figures and the year-to-date line come from different reporting snapshots. Adding Q1 events (767) to Q2 and Q3 gives 1,991 incidents and $666.3 million, while the Q3 release reports 2,072 incidents and $718.9 million for the year so far. CargoNet’s Q3 release notes that “prior-period figures may differ from those previously published because of late-reported incidents.” It does not break down this particular gap, but the year-to-date figure is the latest total to use for 2026.

Cargo theft statistics by state (Q3 2026)

Four states accounted for 57 percent of Q3 2026 incidents, and each recorded fewer incidents than a year earlier.

California led both quarters that published state counts this year, with 277 incidents in Q1 and 182 in Q3, and it recorded 1,218 incidents across 2025. On its own it accounted for about a third of Q3 incidents. New Jersey’s path has been uneven: it jumped from 27 to 59 incidents in Q1, which CargoNet described as continuing a trend it identified in Q3 2025, then fell year over year in Q3 while still ranking second. Texas had the steepest percentage drop of the four. CargoNet’s Q2 analysis linked part of the California and Texas decline to fewer non-delivery schemes and fewer thefts of unattended loaded trailers, while email-based schemes in both states stayed comparatively stable.

Most stolen cargo in Q3 2026

By count, food and beverage remains the largest category, as it was in 2025, when CargoNet recorded 708 food and beverage thefts (up 47 percent) and a 77 percent rise in metal theft. The highest-value thefts center on electronics, data center materials and metals.

The count does not show the value at stake. Of Q3’s 19 thefts worth $1 million or more, CargoNet said many involved high-value electronics and data center materials. Its Q2 report described enterprise computer and networking equipment, components and cryptocurrency mining hardware worth several million dollars per shipment often moving as conventional dry freight, a gap between a load’s value and its transport security profile. CargoNet also noted that thefts of individual products can persist or rise even when category totals fall, as cosmetics did in Q3.

How the thefts happen

Physical theft of loaded trailers and containers continues, but CargoNet’s reports put growing weight on deception. Its Q2 analysis named business email compromise as the primary access point for many of the quarter’s most sophisticated schemes: a compromised account can expose shipment details, contacts and transportation management tools, letting a crew impersonate a trusted party and alter shipment details while appearing legitimate.

On April 30, 2026 the FBI issued a public service announcement titled “Cyber-Enabled Strategic Cargo Theft Surging”. It describes spoofed emails, fake URLs, compromised carrier accounts, fraudulent load-board postings and loads accepted under a legitimate identity, then redirected to complicit drivers. Its advice is procedural: verify shipment requests independently through a second channel, use two-factor authentication, and document driver, vehicle and contact details for every pickup. How the fake-carrier version works is covered in our guide to fictitious pickup cargo theft.

A second count: Overhaul’s US data

Overhaul publishes its own quarterly US report from a different incident base, so its totals are not interchangeable with CargoNet’s.

• Q1 2026: 574 US incidents, about 6.4 a day, the first year-over-year decline Overhaul had reported since 2021. Deceptive pickups rose 31 percent, with nearly half in California. States: California 36%, Texas 17%, Illinois 13%, Tennessee 12%. Commodities: electronics 17%, food and drinks 15%, auto and parts 11%, clothing and shoes 11%.
• Q2 2026: 605 US incidents, up 5 percent from Q1 and down 5 percent from Q2 2025.

Both sources report year-over-year declines in total incidents for the 2026 quarters they cover. Their deception figures cover different periods, so they cannot be compared directly: Overhaul’s Q1 shows deceptive pickups up 31 percent, while CargoNet’s fictitious pickup counts dipped slightly in Q2 and Q3 as their share of all incidents grew. Their commodity rankings also differ, which likely reflects differences in coverage, classification and period.

The federal policy response (as of May 2026)

On May 15, 2026 the American Trucking Associations reported that the House Appropriations Committee had approved $4 million in the fiscal 2027 Commerce, Justice and Science funding bill: $2 million for FBI-led regional cargo theft task forces and $2 million for additional prosecutors. As of that announcement it was a committee-approved proposal, not enacted funding.

Where these numbers fall short

Every figure here comes from reported incidents, and reporting is uneven. CargoNet also separates broader supply chain crime events from confirmed thefts, as its Q1 and full-year figures show. Some victims never report, some report late, and many reports carry no stated value, so CargoNet’s averages cover only thefts with a documented commodity value. Its Q2 note says that quarter’s $564,009 average was heavily influenced by a small number of extreme losses, which means a single quarter’s average can swing sharply. The datasets also differ in scope (US and Canada for CargoNet, US only for Overhaul) and in what they count. State totals show where thefts were reported, not the risk on any particular shipment.

Using the statistics to set tracking priorities

A lock cannot confirm that the driver at the dock is the one you booked, and a trailer tracker cannot follow freight once it is moved to another vehicle. The patterns in these reports favor controls that check who collects a load and show where the goods themselves go.

1. Start with what you ship. Metals, enterprise electronics and computing hardware, beverages and cosmetics are the categories the reports keep naming. Combine that with your own shipment values, stops and facilities, and with the states where reported thefts concentrate, to decide which lanes to cover first.
2. Track the freight, not only the truck. A tracker placed inside the carton or under the pallet wrap can keep reporting after a load changes vehicles, subject to coverage, battery and placement. GPX’s MicroTrack ships inside the box. The disposable SmartLabel (as low as $13 per label, with final pricing set by volume) suits high-volume one-way freight because nothing has to be recovered, but it has no GPS or cellular radio: it relies on nearby devices to relay its position, so updates are more frequent on busy routes and can arrive in batches. Match the device to how quickly you need to know a load has gone off course.
3. Set geofences on the sites that matter. Shipment tracking with geofences at origin, stops and destination can flag a load that leaves the wrong site or misses its arrival. The alert only helps if someone monitors it and has a response plan, such as calling the carrier and escalating to law enforcement. In the GPX platform, Scout AI can geofence sites and send alerts on unauthorized movement.
4. Keep the FBI’s verification steps alongside the technology. Second-channel checks with independently confirmed contact details reduce the chance of releasing a load to an impostor; tracking helps when something still goes wrong.

For the procedural side of a full program, see our cargo theft prevention guide. The GPX live demo shows how tracked assets appear on the platform’s map.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

How much cargo is stolen in the US and Canada each year?

Verisk CargoNet estimated about $725 million in cargo theft losses across the US and Canada in 2025, up 60 percent from 2024, from 2,646 confirmed thefts. For 2026, estimated losses reached $718.9 million from January through September. A separate US-only dollar total is not published in the sources tracked here.

Which state has the most cargo theft?

California. It recorded 277 incidents in Q1 2026, 182 in Q3 2026 and 1,218 across 2025 in CargoNet’s data. In Q3 2026, New Jersey (46), Texas (43) and Illinois (40) followed, and Los Angeles, San Bernardino and Riverside counties were named among the concentrations.

Why are cargo theft losses rising when incidents are falling?

CargoNet describes organized groups as increasingly selective, targeting high-value shipments. In Q3 2026 it recorded 19 thefts worth $1 million or more, against 9 a year earlier, and the average documented value from January through September was 72 percent higher than in the same months of 2025.

What is a fictitious pickup?

A fictitious pickup is a theft in which criminals pose as a legitimate carrier or driver and collect the load with paperwork that appears valid. CargoNet counted 138 in Q3 2026, roughly a quarter of all incidents, a larger share than a year earlier even though the count dipped slightly.

How often is this page updated?

After each Verisk CargoNet release. In 2026 its quarterly analyses came out in April, August and November, and its 2025 full-year analysis in January. Each update adds a row to the tracker table and an entry to the update log below.

Update log

• November 6, 2026: Rebuilt as a quarterly tracker. Added Verisk CargoNet’s Q1, Q2 and Q3 2026 figures, Q3 state and commodity tables, 2026 year-to-date totals, Overhaul’s Q1 and Q2 2026 US data, the FBI’s April 2026 advisory and the House cargo theft funding proposal.
• August 24, 2026: First published with Verisk CargoNet’s full-year 2025 figures.