GoKawiilTL;DR: Cargo thieves are targeting equipment used in AI data centers, from server switches to cooling systems and networking hardware. In two recent California cases, criminals appear to have used car crashes to separate trucks from their security escorts before the shipments vanished. The incidents highlight how organized groups are using carrier-identity fraud, GPS manipulation and, increasingly, aggressive roadside tactics to steal high-value technology moving through the freight network.
The shipments were moving from Silicon Valley to Southern California, according to Gerardo Pachuca, a freight security consultant and former Los Angeles sheriff's detective. Each truck was being followed by a private escort vehicle. In one case, another driver rear-ended the escort car and fled. In the other, a vehicle hit the escort in what appeared to be a PIT maneuver, causing it to spin.
The trucks kept moving after the escorts were disabled, but they did not reach their destinations, Pachuca said. The drivers and the equipment have not been found.
Wired could not independently verify the incidents because Pachuca did not provide enough details to identify the cases, citing ongoing investigations. Still, two freight industry sources said they had heard about the attacks.
J.J. Coughlin, chairman of the Southwest Transportation Security Council, said an escort company reported an attack while protecting "high-value technology." Danny Ramon, director of intelligence and response at freight-monitoring software company Overhaul, said law enforcement sources told him about the rear-ending incident. He called it a "coordinated assault" involving "AI hardware."
No one was injured. Pachuca, Coughlin, and Ramon believe the truck drivers may have been involved, though the cases remain unresolved.
"It's the worst I've seen," Pachuca says of cargo theft nationwide. "The methods they are using, the value they are getting, the frequency these crimes are occurring."
The thefts come as data center construction expands and the value of the equipment inside those facilities rises. AI systems require costly chips, servers, switches, optical equipment, and cooling components. Those products can be moved through regular freight networks, often with security practices that do not reflect the value of the load.
CargoNet, a Verisk business that tracks cargo theft, reported that theft incidents fell 26% year over year during the most recent quarter. But the value of stolen goods more than doubled. The shift reflects growing interest in expensive goods, including metals, computer equipment, and network hardware.
In April, thieves allegedly took 34,560 optical transceiver cables and 96 network switch modules that were being shipped from Olive Branch, Mississippi, to Richardson, Texas. The equipment was intended for data center use.
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