Well, we made it! 2025 is now in the rearview, and 2026 is in full swing. Every year, the National Motor Freight Traffic Association, Inc.® (NMFTA)™ cybersecurity team tracks emerging threats and the evolution of existing threats to bring the annual cybersecurity trends report to the transportation industry. The team dug deep for the 2026 report, producing one of the most extensive reports on transportation cybersecurity to date.
The past year brought a dynamic and fast-paced threat landscape, with emerging technology heavily influencing the ways that bad actors executed their attacks. Groups of cybercriminals reorganized into more corporate-like structures, and alliances between groups were formed that combined expertise and increased the success rates for these criminal organizations. Social engineering reached new levels of both sophistication and impact, with many high-profile attacks beginning with “simple” social engineering actions, driving home the imperative that social engineering awareness training must be prioritized as we enter 2026.
Application programming interface (API) security (or insufficient API security) continued to be a major player in the attacks that dominated 2025 as well. With a dramatic increase in the number of machine identities (think: AI agents, automated integrations, etc.) being deployed, incorrect access controls and poor API security posed a growing threat that is anticipated to carry over into 2026.
Cybercrime was not limited to the digital world though, with cyber-enabled cargo crimes reaching unprecedented levels in 2025. The same tools, tactics, and procedures (TTPs) used by nation-state threat actors, ransomware gangs, and cyber-extortion rings were also used by organized crime to steal freight and engage in targeted load board fraud and theft of carrier and broker identities.
It’s not all doom and gloom, though. The report notes several significant signs that cybersecurity is increasingly front of mind in many transportation organizations. The transportation industry is sharing cyber-threat intelligence, collaborating on cyber-enabled cargo crime reduction, increasing the frequency and depth of cybersecurity training across all roles in their organizations, and perhaps most importantly, continuing to reduce the stigma around discussing cyber-attacks and cyber-enabled cargo crime incidents.
Cybersecurity is a team sport, and when the whole transportation industry pulls together, we create a winning team that can tackle any challenge coming down the road in 2026.
Check out the 2026 NMFTA Transportation Industry Cybersecurity Trends Report for the full breakdown of all of the trends (new and recurring) that you need to be prepared for this year, register for the upcoming NMFTA cybersecurity webinar set for 1:00 pm ET on Thursday, January 22, 2026.
Additionally, be sure to register for updates on the 2026 NMFTA Cybersecurity Conference. This is the trucking industry’s only cybersecurity event. The call for abstracts is currently open, and early-bird registration is coming soon in February: www.nmftacyber.com
