‘The Worst I’ve Ever Seen’: Cargo Thefts Have Turned Violent in Pursuit of AI Hardware

During the 25 years Gerardo Pachuca has spent investigating thieves who bargain cargo from semitrucks, helium says he’s ne'er seen behaviour this brazen. The advisor and erstwhile Los Angeles sheriff’s detective claims that 2 times successful caller months, robbers stole pricey hardware destined for AI information centers utilizing a confrontational caller tactic. It’s near the freight manufacture connected edge.

The incidents progressive 2 antithetic shipments of high-value exertion traveling from Silicon Valley to Southern California, according to Pachuca, who says helium learned astir the thefts from instrumentality enforcement authorities. Each motortruck was tailed by backstage information professionals driving unmarked escort vehicles, which were expected to guarantee the goods made it to their destinations safely. But hours into 1 journey, different operator rear-ended the escort successful a hit-and-run, forcing it to stop. In the different case, the escort stopped aft different car nudged it into a tailspin, a ploy commonly known arsenic a PIT maneuver, and past fled.

Everyone acquainted with the “accidents” believes the escorts were deliberately immobilized, according to Pachuca. Once the semitrucks mislaid their escorts, the drivers proceeded without halting—but not to their planned destinations. They were ne'er heard from again, Pachua says, and millions of dollars successful information halfway cogwheel remains unaccounted for.

WIRED attempted to independently corroborate Pachuca's accounts with 5 authorities and section instrumentality enforcement agencies, but could not due to the fact that helium shared constricted accusation to debar jeopardizing what helium describes arsenic ongoing investigations. But 2 different radical successful the cargo manufacture provided corroborating information.

J.J. Coughlin, president of the Southwest Transportation Security Council, a nonprofit intelligence-sharing group, says 1 of the affected escort companies notified him arsenic soon arsenic its conveyance was attacked portion it was guarding “high-value technology.” Danny Ramon, manager of quality and effect astatine the freight-monitoring bundle developer Overhaul, says helium learned astir the rear-ending incidental from instrumentality enforcement sources days aft it happened. He describes the concern arsenic a “coordinated assault” affecting a shipment of “AI hardware.”

Pachuca, Coughlin, and Ramon each accidental that nary 1 was wounded successful the attacks—they presume the motortruck drivers were successful connected the scheme, an progressively communal issue—and the perpetrators person yet to beryllium caught. They are each acrophobic that the isolated cases could crook into an alarming trend—a convulsive rotation connected freight crime, present enabled by cyber-based scams and hacks, and targeting the precise instrumentality powering the bleeding borderline of the internet.

“It’s the worst I’ve seen,” Pachuca says of cargo theft nationwide. “The methods they are using, the worth they are getting, the frequence these crimes are occurring.”

Escort companies are a last enactment of defence and are progressively successful demand. Michael Duffy, CEO of Solutions Group International, says his escort concern utilized to beryllium engaged chiefly up of the vacation buying season, but it has present picked up year-round, with companies moving liquid cooling parts, servers, and machine chips emerging arsenic his biggest clients. “Now that the values person changeable done the roof, we’re getting called each the time,” Duffy says. He estimates his institution has protected 13,000 shipments implicit the past 4 years, without a azygous loss.

High-value cargo and their escort vehicles person been targeted successful Mexico and different countries for years. The suspected attacks successful the US are present prompting escort operators to find ways to beef up their security, and immoderate are encouraging unit to telephone 911 astatine the archetypal motion of suspicion. “We’ve been trying to travel up with a crippled plan,” says Rachel Fruchtenicht of Shadow Freight Security.

AI Heists

Cargo theft has been connected the emergence since the commencement of the Covid pandemic, erstwhile much consumers turned to ecommerce and transportation for their regular needs. More recently, the booming AI information halfway manufacture has created a caller people for would-be thieves: Total spending connected their operation successful conscionable the archetypal fractional of this twelvemonth surpassed the full for each of 2025. While the wide fig of thefts reported past 4th fell 26 percent twelvemonth implicit year, the worth of the goods taken much than doubled arsenic criminals are progressively targeting costly cargo, according to caller information released this period by Verisk CargoNet, an analytics and hazard appraisal firm.

Some of the astir commonly stolen goods see metals—especially copper—and enterprise-grade machine and networking equipment, according to Verisk CargoNet. These shipments are typically transported according to modular procedures, creating “a important mismatch betwixt their fiscal worth and their mean proscription and information profile,” Verisk CargoNet said successful an announcement accompanying the caller data.