Carrier Identity Theft: Signs Your MC Was Cloned and What to Do

Fraudsters don't only pretend to be brokers. They also pretend to be carriers, using a real company's MC number, name and insurance to book loads they never intend to haul honestly. When it's your identity, you can end up with stolen cargo, angry brokers and a damaged reputation, for loads you never touched. Here's how to spot it early and what to do.

What carrier identity theft looks like

The most common forms:

• Cloning. Someone sets up a lookalike email domain and phone number, sends brokers your real authority letter and a fake insurance certificate, and books loads as you. The freight gets re-brokered or stolen.
• Account takeover. Someone gets into your email, load board account or FMCSA registration and changes your contact or payment details, so brokers pay them instead of you.
• Dormant authority hijacking. An inactive or rarely used authority gets taken over and used as a clean-looking front.

These schemes feed the wider fraud problem. Cargo theft losses reached about $725 million in the US and Canada in 2025, up 60% from 2024, according to CargoNet. Cloned identities are also one of the main ways double brokering happens.

Signs your MC has been cloned

• Brokers call about loads you never booked, or ask where "your" truck is
• You receive setup packets, rate confirmations or invoices you didn't request
• A broker says your email or phone number "changed"
• Load board accounts or broker portals show activity you didn't do
• Your FMCSA registration shows contact details you didn't enter
• Your insurance agent gets certificate requests from brokers you've never worked with

Any one of these is worth a same-day check. Fraud using your identity usually moves fast.

Securing your FMCSA account in Motus

FMCSA's registration now runs through its Motus system, which is built partly to stop registration fraud. According to Benesch's summary of the rollout, Motus:

• requires a Login.gov account for anyone managing a USDOT registration, including carriers that already had numbers,
• verifies the identity of the company official with a government ID and a face scan,
• requires a real principal place of business where records are kept, and flags addresses such as mail drops shared by many companies.

For you, that means:

• Make sure your company official has claimed your USDOT number in Motus with their own Login.gov account
• Turn on the strongest sign-in option available
• Never share that login with anyone, including a dispatcher
• Keep your principal place of business and contact details current

If you haven't logged in since the switch, do it now and confirm everything on file is yours.

Ten ways to protect your company

1. Use a business email on your own domain, not a free account. Lookalikes are easier to spot.
2. Turn on two-factor sign-in for email, load boards, factoring portals, ELD and bank accounts.
3. Tell your brokers how to verify you: your official phone number, and that you'll never change payment details by email alone.
4. Check your FMCSA record regularly for changes you didn't make.
5. Ask your insurance agent to call you before sending certificates to brokers you haven't worked with.
6. Watch the major broker monitoring and carrier verification services that brokers use. Many let carriers report impersonation.
7. Limit who has your documents. Your authority letter, W-9 and insurance certificate are what fraudsters copy.
8. Don't reuse passwords, and never give anyone your FMCSA or load board login.
9. Keep your contact information consistent everywhere brokers look: FMCSA, your website and your packet.
10. Train anyone who answers your phone or email to verify callers before sharing documents.

What a fake email looks like

Most carrier impersonation starts with email. Brokers spot fakes by small details, and so can you if someone is copying you:

• A domain one letter off from yours, or the same name on a free email service
• A display name that's right, with an address behind it that isn't
• Your real authority letter and W-9 attached, with a phone number that isn't yours
• Urgent requests to change payment details "for this load only"
• Insurance certificates with your company name but the wrong agent or policy number

Ask a broker you trust to forward anything suspicious that claims to be from you. It's the fastest way to find out how a fraudster is presenting your company.

What to do if it happens

1. Document everything: the broker's name, load numbers, emails, phone numbers and the fake domain or documents.
2. Call the brokers involved on their public numbers. Tell them the loads aren't yours and give them your verified contact details.
3. Secure your accounts: change passwords on email, FMCSA, load boards and banking, and check for changed payment or contact details.
4. Notify your insurance agent and your factoring company, if you use one.
5. Report it to FMCSA's National Consumer Complaint Database, the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center, local law enforcement and the load boards where the fake loads appeared.
6. Warn the brokers you work with before they hear it somewhere else.

Move fast. Fraud with a cloned identity often runs for only a few days before the fraudsters switch to another company, so the first brokers you call are the ones most likely to stop a load that's still moving. Keep a short written statement ready that you can send to every broker at once.

Cleaning up afterward

Keep a written timeline and copies of every report. Brokers who were fooled may ask for it before they work with you again, and it helps if a claim or inspection gets wrongly tied to your company. Check your FMCSA record over the following weeks for inspections, crashes or registration changes that aren't yours, and dispute anything wrong.

Most of all, don't let it make you hard to reach. Brokers who can verify you quickly will keep loading you.

A dispatcher helps on both sides of fraud. Ours check every broker before booking and flag mismatched paperwork before your truck moves. See how we vet brokers, or read how to check a broker yourself.