Double brokering is no longer just a “cost of doing business”—it is an organized, multi-million dollar fraud scheme crippling the American supply chain. Scammers are establishing fake brokerages, securing loads from legitimate shippers, and illegally passing them off to actual carriers at deeply discounted rates.
The result? The carrier does the heavy lifting, the phantom broker pockets the difference, and when the invoice is due, the scammer vanishes. This epidemic is fueled by a lack of rigorous vetting processes on load boards and regulatory loopholes that allow bad actors to seamlessly dissolve and re-register MC numbers. The solution requires a unified front: carriers must strictly enforce “payment upon delivery” terms for unvetted brokers, and load boards must implement strict KYC (Know Your Customer) protocols. The era of the phantom middleman must end.