Physical security risk management for logistics
Cargo theft losses rose 60 percent last year, and your exposure is spread across warehouses, yards, and lanes that each carry a different risk. Holtium brings the whole network into one place, puts a dollar figure on the risk at each site and lane, and helps your team decide what to fix first.
If your operation is plants and production lines rather than freight and distribution, see Holtium for Manufacturing.
The stakes
in reported US cargo theft losses in 2025, up 60 percent in a year, while incident counts held nearly flat. The thefts are getting bigger, not more frequent.
Verisk CargoNet, 2026.
average value per theft in 2025, up 36 percent in a year, as organized groups target the highest-value loads rather than steal opportunistically.
Verisk CargoNet, 2026.
of cargo theft incidents worldwide involve insiders, often with access to shipment information that tells them exactly which load to take.
BSI Consulting and TT Club, 2025 Cargo Theft Report.
The threat changed faster than the budget did
A distribution center full of customer freight, a yard of loaded trailers, and a lane through a high-theft corridor are three different risks, and your budget has to cover all of them. Meanwhile the threat itself has changed: theft used to mean a cut lock at 2 a.m., and now it means a fraudulent carrier with clean paperwork collecting the load in daylight.
Most logistics security teams manage this with warehouse audits in separate documents, carrier scorecards nobody connects to sites, and spending decisions defended by judgment alone. When the CFO asks why the next dollar goes to yard cameras and not secured parking, there is no evidence behind the answer. That is the gap this page is about.
Business risk through a physical security lens
US cargo theft losses reached roughly $725 million reported in 2025, up 60 percent in a year, with the average theft now worth about $274,000 as organized groups target high-value loads (Verisk CargoNet).
The fastest-growing method is not a cut lock but a fictitious pickup: a fraudulent carrier with legitimate-looking paperwork collects the load, and it is gone before anyone knows to look. The direct loss is replacement, and the freight claim and the customer relationship behind it often cost more.
BSI Consulting and TT Club find insider involvement in about 22 percent of cargo theft incidents worldwide, and when the same containers keep getting hit, someone had access to shipment information.
Freight that disappears from inside your fence is a replacement cost first, then legal exposure, then a customer deciding whether to keep tendering you loads.
Secured truck parking is scarce on most US corridors, so drivers and loaded trailers spend nights in lots chosen out of necessity rather than safety.
An attempted theft that turns into a confrontation is a safety response cost first and legal exposure second, and drivers remember which companies left them exposed when they decide where to work next.
Networks concentrate: one cross-dock, one cold storage hub, or one yard often carries volume the rest of the network cannot absorb.
A security incident that closes it for even a day cascades into missed tenders, service failures, and contract penalties, a productivity loss that can dwarf whatever was actually taken.
Criminal groups now use data scraping, fake carrier identities, and fraudulent documents to intercept loads through fictitious pickups and double brokering schemes (BSI Consulting and TT Club).
That makes identity verification at the dock and in your transportation management system a physical security control, because the loss it prevents is a trailer of freight, not a data record.
The platform your security team runs the program on, tuned to how a logistics network operates
Holtium brings your risks, controls, locations, and spending into one place, helps your team decide what to do next, and measures it all in dollars so leadership can act on it. A Holtium team works alongside yours, so you get the analysis without building it.
Your risk register covers the risks this industry actually carries: theft in transit and fictitious-pickup fraud, warehouse and yard theft, driver safety on the road, interruption at the hubs your network depends on, and the cyber-enabled fraud that ends in a missing load. Build it in the platform, or bring in the one you already have.
Control mapping connects every control you already run, gate and dock access, yard cameras, high-security seals, carrier vetting, secured parking arrangements, and TAPA-aligned facility controls, to the risks it reduces and the sites and lanes it covers, so you can see that the flagship distribution center is well protected while two cross-docks and one lane are carrying more exposure than anyone had written down.
The roadmap turns decisions into tasks with owners, budgets, and tracking, and the What-If simulator shows the effect of a decision before you commit a dollar to it, such as requiring secured parking on a theft-prone lane versus hardening the yard at a hub, so prioritization across the network is an evidenced decision rather than an instinct.
A dollar figure your CFO will question, built to survive the questioning
We start with your baseline, the risk each site and lane would face with nothing but doors, walls, and locks, then subtract what your current controls already prevent. What remains is your exposure today, broken into the losses behind it, such as replacing a stolen load, the service failures a closed hub causes, and the legal exposure when a customer's freight disappears.
It is built on recognized standards and loss data, the same quantitative discipline used in cyber, operational risk, and engineering. It begins as a range rather than a false-precise figure and sharpens as we verify your controls, and every figure traces back to what drove it.
Each quarter, leadership gets an executive risk report that reads like finance: where exposure stands across the network, what moved it, and what comes next.
Inherent, losses avoided, and residual risk exposure, split into loss types. Logistics sample data.
“I’ve always had to prove security’s value through investigations and guard reductions. Holtium lets me put a defensible dollar figure on risk avoidance across all our distribution centers, in language my CFO and legal chief accept.”
Your warehouse audits and carrier files are the input, not wasted work
You share what you already track, in any format: warehouse audits, TAPA certification records, carrier scorecards, guard post orders, insurance schedules. We map it to your risks, sites, and lanes for you, and most teams are up and running within weeks. Your job is to review and confirm, not to do the heavy lifting.
Questions logistics teams ask
How do you put a dollar figure on physical security risk?
We model each risk at each site and lane using recognized standards and loss data, the same quantitative discipline used in cyber, operational risk, and engineering. The figure starts as a range, sharpens as your controls are verified, and always traces back to what drove it, so your team can defend it in front of a CFO or a customer.
We already run warehouse security audits and carrier scorecards. Do we start over?
No. Existing audits and scorecards are exactly the input the platform wants. We ingest them, map the findings to risks, controls, sites, and lanes, and your team reviews and confirms. The warehouse security risk assessment you paid for last year becomes part of the quantified picture instead of a PDF in a drawer.
We hold TAPA certifications and participate in C-TPAT. What does Holtium add?
TAPA's facility and trucking security requirements and C-TPAT define what good supply chain security looks like, and the certifications prove you meet the bar. Holtium shows what each remaining gap costs in dollars, which sites and lanes carry it, and what closing it is worth, so certification work and the rest of your program are prioritized in one roadmap. Your TAPA and C-TPAT controls arrive already mapped, as evidence of what you prevent today.
Our insurer wants evidence of security on high-value loads. Does this help?
Yes. Underwriters increasingly expect layered security on high-value freight, and Holtium keeps that evidence in one place: which controls protect which sites and lanes, what condition they are in, and which risks leadership formally accepted and why. Teams use the same record to answer customer security questionnaires with documentation instead of recollection.
How do you prevent fictitious pickups?
The controls are identity verification at the dock, carrier vetting, and pickup confirmation procedures, and Holtium maps each one to the fraud risk it reduces at each site. The platform shows which gates and yards carry the most fraud exposure in dollars, so verification effort goes where the loss potential is highest.
See what your exposure is worth across your network
You stay in charge of the program. We do the analysis, so you get the evidence without building it.
