Who is Highway? What every carrier and broker should know.
A private company, not the government, has quietly put itself between carriers and the freight they are allowed to haul. This is what it does, in its own words and on the public record.
LoadWrap exists to protect every participant in transportation, carriers, brokers and shippers, from fraud, and to do it strictly through the law and the public FMCSA record. Never through a private third party.
A large number of our members asked us directly to look into Highway and to publish what we found. We answered. We are not fighting anyone and we are not speaking through anyone. We are simply publishing the truth, in the open, backed by the public record. This page is for every legal carrier being pushed out of work, and for every broker and shipper who deserves to know how the system they rely on actually operates.
Carriers did not choose this. They were pulled into it.
Over the last two years the freight world quietly reorganized itself around Highway. Brokers began to insist on it. No Highway, no load. Most brokers are acting in good faith. They believe that requiring Highway is part of doing things by the book, part of staying compliant and protecting their freight.
What they are not told is this. Highway is a private company operating by its own rules, not the government's. So a broker who only wants to follow the law ends up enforcing a private company's policy instead, without realizing it. The carrier is told to get on Highway as if it were a legal requirement. It is not.
And the people it hurts most are the very carriers who follow every federal rule and actually move the freight. A made-up requirement, mistaken for the law, quietly shutting honest carriers out of work. That is the heart of it.
Nobody elected Highway. It put itself in the middle.
Highway is a private, for-profit app, founded in 2022. It is not a government agency. It is not FMCSA. It has no legal authority over any carrier and no public mandate. No regulator ordered the industry to use it.
What happened is simpler than that. Highway placed itself between carriers and brokers on its own, sold subscriptions to brokers, and as more brokers signed on, the rest felt they had to follow. By its own account, Highway says it serves more than 1,050 broker customers, including 70 of the 100 largest brokers in America (figures published by Highway and FTV Capital, reported by FreightWaves and Dallas Innovates). In 2025 it took a strategic growth-equity investment led by FTV Capital and Lead Edge Capital (FTV Capital and BusinessWire, August 2025). The amount of that round was not publicly disclosed, though third-party trackers put Highway's total funding to date at around $225 million (Crunchbase and PitchBook). A private toll booth now sits on the road between a legal carrier and a paying load.
The business model is brokers paying Highway. Whether an honest carrier keeps working is not part of that equation.
What Highway actually does.
Stripped of the marketing, here is what carriers are asked to accept to keep hauling freight:
- Hand over a government photo ID and a live photo of your face. Since September 2025 Highway has made this mandatory; refuse and you cannot keep an active account. Stop and think about who is on the other end. You are giving your driver's license and your face to a private company, not a government agency. It is a private business, not a public institution, and it is not bound by the due process a government agency is.
- Connect and expose your ELD. Highway's own published policy ties access to freight to whether your ELD is connected to Highway, sorting carriers into tiers based on it. And once it is connected, by Highway's own admission, it uses your location history. It is not the broker watching where your truck is. It is Highway, a private company, tracking your movements.
- Accept a private rating you cannot see or appeal. Carriers report being flagged "Access Disabled" or "Failed Assessment" with no explanation and no proof when they ask for one. Often you cannot even see your own status. The only way many carriers find out what Highway says about them is if a friendly broker shares their screen. The broker simply declines you, and you never learn why. You have no say in it and no way to correct it, the same kind of invisible black mark a FreightGuard report on Carrier411 leaves on a carrier.
- Live with broker coordination. In a Texas court filing, Highway's own Chief Risk Officer described a broker wanting to exclude an entire group of carriers from freight (see the court record below).
None of this comes from a federal rule. It comes from a private company's product decisions, applied to legal carriers who have done nothing wrong.
Put it all together. Every one of these demands is imposed not by the government but by a single ordinary limited liability company, one most people in freight have never even heard of, that works hand in hand with brokers. It rates you, and it decides whether you are allowed to work, on its terms and not yours.
A business you spent years building can now depend entirely on the say-so of a no-name private company. That is the part nobody ever agreed to.
Legal only if it is applied lawfully, and evenly.
To be clear, there is nothing illegal about a company offering a vetting service, and nothing illegal about a broker choosing to trust it. The law allows it. But that trust comes with one condition. The service has to follow the law in full and apply it evenly to everyone, not selectively, not by mood, and not against carriers the law itself protects.
What the complaints show is different. They show that a single private company can flip a switch and, in effect, end a carrier's business overnight. The power to decide who works and who does not, held by one unelected company that sits between every carrier and the freight, is exactly the kind of power that raises serious questions, the questions fair-competition law exists to ask. We are not declaring anyone a monopoly. That is for a court to decide on proof. We are pointing at the power itself, and asking whether any single private company should hold it.
When you run an honest business, it should depend on you. Here it depends on them. Whether someone inside an anonymous company follows the law, or marks you "not valid" on their own will, can erase everything you built over years.
There is a deeper point here. Deciding whether a carrier is legitimate, safe, compliant, and fit to haul is a judgment that should belong to a public authority, not to a private app. In America that authority is the federal government, through the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) and the public safety record it maintains, or another competent regulator. Those institutions answer to the law and to the public, they are subject to due process, and their decisions can be reviewed and appealed.
A private company answers to its own customers and its own bottom line. We believe a decision this serious, whether a legal business is allowed to work, belongs with the public institutions that were built for it and are accountable for it, not with a company no one elected and no one can appeal to.
Everyone loses, not just carriers.
It is easy to read this as a carrier problem. It is bigger than that. When a reliable, fully compliant carrier is marked "not valid" inside Highway, the broker loses too. The broker cannot book a carrier the system has flagged, even when that carrier is legitimate, has the equipment, and is offering a better price. Someone, somewhere inside a private company, entered a verdict, and a good load and a good carrier never meet.
Picture a load in rural Wyoming with one truck nearby, a legal carrier, ready to haul, offering a fair price. The broker cannot book it, because Highway flagged it "not valid." The freight sits for two days waiting for another truck to show up, and the shipper loses its customer. The truck was right there the whole time.
Multiply that across thousands of brokers and tens of thousands of carriers, and the cost lands on the whole market. Shippers pay more. Capacity that should be moving freight sits idle. Honest carriers leave the business. The one thing that does not change is the toll being collected in the middle.
When a private gate sits between every load and every truck, the whole American freight market pays for it. Not just the carrier who got flagged.
Highway, in its own words.
This is not our characterization. Our members asked us to put it on the record, so we are. Everything below was said by Highway's own representatives on recorded support calls in December 2024. Both sides were on notice that the calls were recorded; Highway's own phone system announces it at the start of every call. We hold the recordings.
When a carrier called to ask why a fully legal operation was being blocked, this is how Highway explained its own system:
Read plainly: the platform is built for the broker side, the carrier is the one being measured, and Highway is in active, agreement-level coordination with brokers over what carriers can and cannot do.
Read more of what Highway told carriers on the recorded line
On the same calls, Highway's representatives also said the following. We have removed the names of individual brokers and employees. The words are Highway's.
Even the phone menu tells the story. Highway's automated line offers a dedicated option, "for assistance regarding an ELD connection, please press 3," with its own ELD team. ELD gatekeeping is not a side feature. It is a core department.
We are disclosing these recordings because our members asked us to, and because carriers and brokers have a right to hear, in Highway's own words, how the system they are pushed onto actually works. If any quote here is challenged, we have the recording.
Where the story does not add up.
Put Highway's public statements next to Highway's own policy, its own emails, and its own recorded calls, and the same company tells two different stories. We are not interpreting. We are placing their words side by side and letting you read both.
Highway "only tracks location while a carrier is on a contracted load," and "once the load is completed, Highway does not retrieve or retain real-time location data." It also lists driver information, photos, and safety events under what it does not collect.Highway, quoted by Overdrive, March 2025, and Highway's own policy
In the same policy, under "Here's what we do," Highway writes: "We use location history to increase your rank in relevant lane search results." Ranking a carrier in search results is not a contracted load.Highway published policy, "Your ELD Connection to Highway"
Highway says it only follows your truck during a paid load. Its own policy says it uses your location history to rank you. We place both statements side by side and let you judge.
"Highway does not require ELD integration to haul a load. Brokers set their own policies."Highway, quoted by Overdrive, March 2025
In an email to a carrier, Highway wrote that it works "to simplify this transition as more brokers mandate ELD connectivity for network access," and that connecting your ELD gives "entry to the TFX Load Board and improved profile visibility." On a recorded call: "we're already working with the brokers so they can get that on, but we will need to pass for an agreement."Highway email, May 2026, and recorded call, December 2024
The catch: publicly the brokers decide alone. In writing and on the phone, Highway is the one working with brokers to push ELD connection and is the one deciding who gets "the best freight."
"We do not have the ability to accept ELD exemptions. It is our customers who get to make ELD exemptions."Highway, quoted by Overdrive, March 2025
Highway's own screen tells a legally exempt carrier "ELD Exempt is not certified by Highway," and on a recorded call a representative said "we don't have an option on Highway" for a simple no-ELD choice. The exempt path the law guarantees does not exist inside their product.Highway carrier account screen and recorded call
The catch: Highway says exemptions are the broker's call, while its own product labels a lawful exempt carrier "not certified" and offers no exempt path.
Highway markets itself as neutral carrier identity and verification, built to protect everyone in the supply chain.Highway public marketing
"Because the platform has been created for the brokers."Highway representative, recorded call, December 2024
The catch: sold to everyone as neutral, described to a carrier as built for one side.
What this looks like in practice.
Consider a carrier that runs cargo vans under 10,000 pounds, fully exempt from the federal ELD mandate under 49 CFR 395.8. By law this carrier is not required to run an ELD at all. The carrier reaches out to Highway to clear its account, through the app, by email and by phone. This is the answer Highway's own system gives:
Read that again. A carrier the federal government specifically exempts from ELDs is told by a private app that being exempt is "not certified." There is no exempt path. Highway's verification screen asks the carrier to pick an ELD provider and continue; the legal status the government granted simply does not exist inside Highway's product.
And Highway puts the consequence in writing. In its own published policy it states that carriers with an ELD connected to Highway "get access to the best freight," that brokers "prioritize carriers with a connected ELD," and that the connection is used to connect "legitimate carriers" with brokers. For a lawful, exempt carrier without an ELD, the plain implication is the opposite, and it is delivered to brokers as if it were fact.
This is one example. We hold the documentation behind cases like it, screenshots, emails and recorded calls, preserved as evidence. If anyone disputes a specific account, we can show the record.
A court has already looked at Highway.
In Highway App, Inc. v. KenDann Transport (Texas Fifth Court of Appeals, Dallas, Case 05-25-00789-CV, decided March 23, 2026), a motor carrier sued Highway. Highway tried to get the case thrown out under the Texas anti-SLAPP statute, arguing its carrier alert was a matter of public concern. The appeals court rejected that and let the carrier's case proceed, describing the matter as "a garden-variety private business dispute."
In that same public case, Highway's own Chief Risk Officer described, on the record, deciding to place a system-wide alert after learning that at least one freight broker wanted to exclude an entire group of carriers, by address, from any freight job. That is Highway describing broker-driven exclusion in its own sworn words, on a public docket anyone can pull.
Public docket: Highway App, Inc. v. KenDann Transport, Tex. App. 5th Dist., No. 05-25-00789-CV (Mar. 23, 2026). Opinion by Justice Barbare. Affirmed.
Read the full court record, what happened, and the exact words »
Who profits: one family on both sides.
Jordan Graft, Highway's founder and CEO, ran TriumphPay from 2018 to 2021 (LinkedIn; triumph.io). His brother, Aaron Graft, is the founder, vice chairman and CEO of Triumph Financial (Nasdaq: TFIN), a major factoring and payment company in trucking (Triumph Financial; SEC filings). The two being brothers has been reported publicly in the freight press (FreightWaves). Jordan's wife, Brittany Graft, is listed as Highway's Chief Operating Officer on the company's own Better Business Bureau profile (bbb.org).
The two companies are not strangers. Highway's flagship Trusted Freight Exchange is publicly described as powered by Triumph's rating, payment and credit data (Highway and Triumph press materials). Triumph's own SEC filings disclose related-party revenue tied to this relationship growing from roughly $97,000 in fiscal 2023 to about $361,000 in fiscal 2024 to about $537,000 in fiscal 2025 (Triumph Financial proxy statements filed with the SEC; exact figures $97,436, $360,639, $536,687).
We are not telling you what to conclude. The names and the filings are public. When one family helps hold the gate that decides which carriers move freight and also runs a company that profits from financing and paying those same loads, every carrier and every broker has the right to ask hard questions.
Jordan Graft, Founder & CEO, Highway
Aaron P. Graft, Founder, Vice Chairman & CEO, Triumph Financial (Nasdaq: TFIN)
This is not one angry carrier. This is the industry.
In an Overdrive survey of owner-operators, only a small fraction felt vetting services were helping brokers catch bad actors, and a clear majority said carrier vetting services have done nothing good for the trucking industry. A later Overdrive reader survey found roughly 96 percent of owner-operators saw no benefit to themselves from carrier vetting.
The Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association (OOIDA) has warned that vetting programs are blackballing motor carriers on hearsay.
As recorded in 2026, Highway's customer reviews on the Better Business Bureau averaged about 1.23 out of 5, with 93 complaints filed over three years (the BBB profile is currently marked under review). On the Apple App Store, Highway for Carriers holds a 2.3 out of 5 rating.
What carriers are saying, in their own words.
These are real public posts from working carriers. We did not write them.
- "Two more loads lost because of HIGHWAY today. We have been verified since February and suddenly today we have to rescan our DL and Mugshot."TheTruckersReport forum
- "Suddenly over half of the brokers in my Highway account are Access Denied due to a Failed Assessment by Highway."Francis Brown, TruckingOffice
- "Highway is horrible, 3 companies already cancel loads on me because of highway."RG, TruckingOffice
- "They also cancelled loads on us because of highway. I told them show me a proof. Not a word from them."Sam Haliloglu, TruckingOffice
- "This is practically a persecution of the integrity and privacy of all truckers. If you are not integrated into Highway they will not give you loads."Dorys Salazar, TruckingOffice
- "I should never have to produce a registration, title or driver's DL just to be able to haul a load."Chasey, TruckingOffice
- "I refuse to put sensitive information like my DL on some website."TheTruckersReport forum
In fairness, Highway's response.
Highway has publicly denied that it sells or stores ELD data, declines freight for carriers, or tracks carriers outside of specific load agreements. We include their denial so you have the full picture and can judge for yourself. If Highway wants to respond to anything on this page, we will publish their statement in full.
What LoadWrap stands for.
In America we answer to the law, not to a private app. We are not asking anyone to break a rule. We are asking the opposite. Follow the law. Verify carriers the real way, through FMCSA and the public record. If a legal carrier can only work when a private company says so, something is broken.
And we ask for one simple thing: transparency. If a carrier is flagged or reported inside a system like Highway, that carrier has the right to see it. Not the whole world, just the carrier, the carrier's own record, and the reason behind it. No honest business should be turned away by broker after broker with no explanation, left to find out why only if some broker happens to share a screen. If you are going to be judged, you have the right to see the judgment and to answer it.
To shippers, to brokers, and especially to carriers: stand on the law. Do not let a third party with its own financial interest decide who gets to work.
We are handing this to the people who decide.
We are not a court, and we do not decide what is legal. So we are not keeping this to ourselves. LoadWrap is submitting this page and the documentation behind it to the authorities with jurisdiction over how freight business is conducted, including the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, the Federal Trade Commission, the Department of Justice, and the appropriate law enforcement agencies, alongside any other competent authority.
We also invite the Federal Bureau of Investigation to review what we have gathered. We are not making accusations. We are asking the people whose job it is to look.
If there is nothing wrong here, they will say so. If there is, it is for them to act on, not for us. Either way, the full record belongs in front of the people whose job it is to decide.
And we mean this without reservation. We invite every relevant government authority to review and challenge anything on this page. If they prove that anything here is wrong, we will gladly take it down. We say this as a verification platform ourselves. We do similar work to Highway, we check carriers, but we build only on the law and the public FMCSA record, out in the open. Facts are the only thing we stand on. And we are not doing this to gain customers. LoadWrap already has more than enough; this is not a sales pitch and it is not our goal. We are doing it because our members asked us to, and because the truth belongs in the open.
We extend the same openness to Highway itself. If Highway disputes anything on this page, write to us at [email protected] with a statement, and we will publish it here, in full and unedited. Everyone who comes to LoadWrap deserves the whole picture, and that includes Highway's answer. We are giving them the chance to respond.
To be clear about the difference: Highway's statement will be added to this page, never used to take anything off it. The only thing that comes down is content a government authority proves to be untrue. We stand on the law. If the law says we are wrong, we remove it. Highway's reply, we publish.
Hundreds of thousands of carriers and brokers come to LoadWrap. They have a right to know the truth, and the truth is the only thing on this page.
What do you think? Tell the industry.
If Highway has affected you, a carrier, a broker, a dispatcher, anyone, say it here. Keep it truthful and keep it civil. Your words appear below for everyone to read.
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Sources
Highway App, Inc. v. KenDann Transport, Tex. App. 5th Dist. No. 05-25-00789-CV (Justia) · Triumph Financial SEC filings (investor.triumph.io) · FreightWaves (freightwaves.com) · Overdrive (overdriveonline.com) · TheTruckersReport (thetruckersreport.com) · TruckingOffice (truckingoffice.com) · Land Line / OOIDA (landline.media) · Apple App Store · Better Business Bureau (bbb.org) · Highway published policy and press materials (highway.com, triumph.io)
This page is maintained and updated as new public information becomes available.