The Fraudster Gets a Job
Last Friday, 10 October 2025, brought yet another wave of reports about fraudsters obtaining shipments under false pretences and then misappropriating them.
There are now several reports of fraud and attempted fraud virtually every day. Even so, it is worth returning to one particular method that fraudsters have been using with remarkable success.
Some of them have simply stopped impersonating existing transport companies.
Instead, like most people, they have decided to get a job. Given their previous experience, it should come as no surprise that they choose to start their careers in the TSL industry – usually as freight forwarders. After all, by joining a company as a regular employee, they can receive training, professional support and access to all the tools they need.
Sounds unrealistic?
Unfortunately, it is not.
There is usually only one catch: the fraudster’s “career” tends to last just one or two weeks. After that, the employee disappears, leaving the employer with liabilities that may run into several million euros.
FREIGHT FORWARDER WANTED
These cases often begin in the most ordinary way. An honest business owner, having decided at some point that freight forwarding could be a good way to grow the business, posts a job advertisement online — very often in Facebook groups. The advert says that the company is looking for freight forwarding staff and offers a range of benefits, including:
– remote working,
– introductory training,
– access to the necessary work tools, including freight exchanges,
– access to the employer’s TMS.
EMPLOYEE VERIFICATION
A significant part of the industry still has no proper recruitment verification procedures capable of identifying that the person applying for the job may in fact be a fraudster.
In practice, if the candidate appears to have some experience and does not negotiate the terms too aggressively, signing an employment contract may become little more than a formality. And, I assume, the employer is already imagining what the company will do with all the money this new remote freight forwarder is going to earn.
“ARMING” THE FRAUDSTER
Once someone has been hired as a freight forwarder without being properly verified, what else can be done to increase the risk?
Quite a lot, apparently. The employer will often decide that the best approach is to entrust the future of the company – and its assets – as quickly as possible to someone they have never actually met.
This can be done by creating a personalised company email address for the new employee, opening freight exchange accounts in their name and providing them with a company phone number. And because obtaining transport orders may be difficult without company documents, the employee is also given scans of the firm’s licences, permits and insurance policy.
Supervision?
That might be useful. But the person seems to know what they are doing, so perhaps once a week will be enough. Or maybe once every two weeks, because this weekend there happens to be a family trip planned.
BUILDING CREDIBILITY
A fraudster who manages to secure a remote job as a freight forwarder is extremely difficult for potential customers to detect.
They are not impersonating an existing company, so checking contact details will reveal nothing unusual.
They have not hacked the account of a genuine carrier, so contacting other company email addresses or phone numbers will not expose the fraud either.
They have not taken over the shares of an existing transport company, so checking for changes in ownership will also produce a clean result.
The fraudster is operating from within a genuine company that should successfully pass every standard verification check. The company documents are authentic and valid. The contact details are correct. The freight exchange accounts have been properly registered. Everything appears legitimate. Because, technically, it is.
ONE WEEK OF WORK
In simplified terms, the employee accepts transport orders and then “passes them on” to their own “associates” rather than to genuine and reliable carriers. Those associates arrive at the loading point – very often using vehicles fitted with forged registration plates – collect the goods, and disappear.
The fraudster, having successfully built a legitimate-looking cover story, has access to all the tools, accounts and documents registered to a genuine and reputable company, simply because a careless employer gave them access.
By the end of the week, when the first victims realise that their shipments have not reached the intended consignees, the “remote and talented freight forwarder” disappears as well.
THE EMPLOYER
The employer’s situation can be described in one word: DISASTER.
Where shipments disappear during international carriage, the employer’s liability for the employee is governed by strict rules.
Article 3 of the CMR Convention provides that the carrier is liable for the acts and omissions of its employees and of any other persons whose services it uses for the performance of the carriage, whenever those employees or persons are acting within the scope of their functions.
Article 29 of the CMR Convention provides, in essence, that the carrier loses the right to rely on provisions excluding or limiting liability where the damage results from wilful misconduct or conduct regarded by the applicable law as equivalent to wilful misconduct.
The same applies where such conduct is committed by the carrier’s employees or other persons whose services the carrier uses for the performance of the carriage while they are acting within the scope of their functions. In practical terms, this means that the employer may face full liability for the lost shipments, without being able to rely on the standard limitations of liability, including those arising from Article 23(3) of the CMR Convention.
THE CUSTOMER
The position of the customer – most often a freight forwarding company that entrusted the transport to a subcontractor employing the fraudster as a freight forwarder – is also shaped by Articles 3 and 29 of the CMR Convention.
This means that, towards the party entitled to claim compensation, the freight forwarder may itself face full liability if it had previously entered into a contract of carriage with its customer. In my experience, this applies in around 99% of the cases I have reviewed.
Of course, the freight forwarder may then pursue a recovery claim against its subcontractor.
But the real question is: What assets does that subcontractor actually have?
Perhaps enough to cover one, two or three lost shipments. Maybe even five. But if a dozen or more shipments disappear, the subcontractor’s assets are unlikely to be sufficient.
And there have already been fraud cases in which more than 50 shipments disappeared within a single week.
STRENGTHENING VERIFICATION PROCEDURES
Fraudsters are constantly changing their methods, and cases in which they seek employment as freight forwarders or drivers are becoming increasingly common.
However, that doesn’t mean such schemes cannot be detected.
- For employers, detection is entirely realistic. Companies should apply the highest level of care when recruiting new employees and verify both the candidate’s documents and the candidate themselves. This should also include something that increasingly seems to have been forgotten in the age of remote recruitment – actually meeting the person face to face.
- For companies that entrust transport to a business in which such a fraudster has managed to secure employment, the situation is much more difficult.
That means customers need to rethink the way they approach verification – and, in particular, how often they perform it.
A thorough check carried out only when the business relationship begins is no longer enough.
Repeating the verification every three months may also be too little to materially reduce the risk. One way of minimising exposure is to verify the counterparty as often as you use its services = in other words, for every transport contract. And each time, it is worth checking as much information as reasonably possible.
Of course, not every fraud attempt will be detected. But even cutting the risk by half may be enough to prevent losses amounting to tens or hundreds of thousands of euros.
A NEW DECK OF CARDS
During one of our recent meetings concerning the development of the BtrustUP application, someone compared the situation to a card game. Until now, the fraudsters had been holding all the aces — and the game itself was being played with a marked deck.
I did not come up with the comparison, but I consider it exceptionally accurate, so I intend to keep using it.
I believe that the launch of BtrustUP has effectively replaced the deck and started a new game. We may not yet know exactly which cards the fraudsters are holding, but one thing is clear: they have already lost most of their aces. They are also no longer playing with a marked deck, which means that the odds – until now disproportionately weighted in their favour – are beginning to level out.
Whether they like it or not, every transport and freight forwarding company is taking part in this game. Some do not even realise that the game is being played. Some still do not know the rules. The others gain an advantage when they begin protecting their interests at the right moment and take concrete steps to reduce the risk of becoming the next victim of fraud.
Protect Your Cargo with BtrustUP
Fraud methods in the Transport&Logistics industry are constantly evolving, which means that verifying a carrier only once – or relying on documents, freight exchange profiles and basic checks – may no longer be enough.
BtrustUP helps freight forwarders, carriers and logistics companies verify business partners more thoroughly, identify potential warning signs and make safer decisions before entrusting cargo to a counterparty. The platform brings together key verification data and automates time-consuming checks, helping your team reduce operational risk without slowing down day-to-day business.
Verify smarter. Reduce risk. Protect your cargo. Try BtrustUP free of charge and see how automated carrier verification can support your business.