How Tariff & Duty Fraud Is Exploiting Marketplaces And How to Fight Back

Bad actors are exploiting shipping complexities and seller anxiety to execute the next wave of social engineering fraud. Bureau unified risk decisioning.

Author
Daniel Smith

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• Understanding Tariff Fraud
• Factors fueling the rise of Tariff Fraud
• Here’s how Bureau thwarts Tariff Fraud attempts
• Stay ahead of Tariff Fraud with Bureau

At a time when anti-fraud teams are already swamped with synthetic identities, bot-driven abuse, and fake returns, a new disturbing trend is emerging, the tariff fraud.

Fraudsters are leveraging the inherent complexities of global trade and the anxiety around the recently announced tariffs to target merchants and platforms alike. Tariff fraud succeeds because the tactics are both familiar and sophisticated, exploiting the gaps in communication and the rising burden of international compliance.

Understanding Tariff Fraud

Tariff fraud is a type of impersonation fraud where fraudsters pose as customs agents, shipping providers, or compliance team members. They trick users into paying “unexpected fees” using tactics, such as:

• Fraudulent emails or text messages requesting tariff payments
• Phishing sites that imitate legitimate customs portals
• Direct outreach through support channels to convince users into taking urgent action

Given their low capital, limited compliance knowledge, and lack of legal recourse, tariff fraud can be particularly damaging for small cross-border merchants, new eCommerce sellers and dropshippers, logistics and freight solution providers, and immigrants/foreign nationals.

Factors fueling the rise of Tariff Fraud

Tariff fraud has been able to succeed as fraudsters take advantage of the complexities in international trade practices and the lack of clarity around recent tariffs. They pose as representatives from the customs department and play on the fear of seized shipments or regulatory violation, to pressurize victims into acting quickly, often without due diligence, and complying with their demands. Some reasons why tariff fraud has been effective include:

• Complex and opaque international trade practices that involve several existing fees, allowing fraudsters to blend in their demands of fake fees.
• Frequent communications from legitimate but multiple sources, allowing malicious actors to take advantage and send their own phishing emails
• Lack of familiarity with custom procedures and the new tariff rules, especially for small and medium-sized cross-border merchants
• Time-sensitive shipments and freight handling that can be used to create panic and exploit urgencies
• Fear of regulatory non-compliance, fines, and legal action drives victims to act in haste, often overlooking the legitimacy of the “official” communication.
• Inability of current fraud defense systems to identify emerging deviant risk patterns.

New fraud tactics require adaptive fraud solutions, such as Bureau’s unified risk decisioning platform that can prevent tariff fraud with intelligent risk scoring and end-to-end user verification.

Here’s how Bureau thwarts Tariff Fraud attempts

Bureau’s unified risk decisioning platform helps businesses ward off the emerging threat of tariff fraud with a combination of deep device intelligence, behavioral biometrics, anomaly detection, and thorough identity and document verification.

With the ability to scan 2,000+ documents across 190+ countries; uncover mules, collusion, and rogue devices with linkages to international fraud rings; and an expansive global network to leverage the latest threat intelligence, Bureau enables businesses engaged in cross-border trade to:

• Stop impersonation fraud: Detect spoofed customs agents through device fingerprinting, behavioral anomalies, and email signal mismatches.
• Verify global trade partners: Ascertain the legitimacy of customs brokers, freight agents, and suppliers with KYC and KYB checks.
• Prevent mule account payouts: Flag suspicious or dormant accounts that can potentially be used to collect fraudulent payments via UPI, bank transfer, or wallets.
• Catch forged identities and documents: Detect AI-generated customs letters, IDs, and licenses using deepfake and tampering detection.
• Protect business workflows: Secure onboarding, payouts, and partner interactions with real-time risk scoring and orchestration.
• Enrich future fraud investigations: Use data from similar incidents across Bureau’s global network to identify and adapt to emerging attack variants.

Stay ahead of Tariff Fraud with Bureau

Tariff fraud goes beyond phishing to exploit systemic vulnerabilities in cross-border trade management, user communication, and fraud detection. This complex attack tactic, therefore, requires the next level of visibility into user behavior and transaction context.

Bureau empowers marketplaces to identify complex fraud patterns in the early stages and take proactive countermeasures to safeguard business and customer interests. With a foundation built on behavioral science, network-level signal sharing, and flexible orchestration, Bureau’s unified risk decisioning platform enables businesses to fight emerging fraud techniques without adding friction for legitimate users.