Fraud Protection for Your Marketplace, Explained in Plain English
By Hammed Omoyele · · 3 min read
Founders usually come to me about fraud after something has already gone wrong. A payment gets disputed. Sales suddenly spike overnight in a way that doesn't feel right. Someone figures out how to pay themselves using a stolen card. The fix almost always costs less than people expect, because most of the real protection is already sitting inside Sharetribe and Stripe. The work is knowing where to look and how to set it up properly.
Here's what that usually looks like:
1. Understand how your platform already holds funds before paying out sellers
Sharetribe's transaction process holds provider earnings until the transaction is marked as complete, either by the customer or automatically after a set period. This built-in delay is your first and cheapest layer of fraud protection, and most founders don't realize it's already there. If you need a longer delay than the default, that requires a code change to the transaction process.
2. Check the free risk evaluation that Stripe automatically runs on every payment
Stripe assigns each transaction a risk level (Normal, Elevated, or High) and you can see this directly in your Stripe dashboard at no extra cost. You don't need to turn anything on; you just need to know to check it. If you see High or Elevated risk payments, you contact Stripe Support immediately for guidance. For active blocking rules on top of this, Stripe Radar is an optional paid upgrade.
3. Set up who's even allowed to buy or sell on your marketplace in the first place
Sharetribe's built-in access control lets you make your marketplace private, require manual approval before new users can join, restrict which accounts can post listings or initiate transactions, and ban bad actors outright. All of this is available without any custom code, and it stops problems before they can even start.
4. Build a simple automatic alert for unusual activity
Using Zapier, you can set up email notifications that fire when transactions are initiated, users sign up, or messages are sent, so you find out the same day instead of a month later. The goal is an alert the moment your transaction or sign-up activity jumps in a way that doesn't make sense.
5. Add ID verification only if your marketplace needs it
If your marketplace needs a full ID verification step before someone can transact, that can be set up without custom code using Zapier and a service called iDenfy. It connects to Sharetribe's access control so that verified users automatically gain the right permissions, and unverified users stay restricted until they complete the process.
My approach
I work almost entirely with Sharetribe marketplaces, and my approach is simple: use everything the platform already gives you first, and only add custom code where it actually earns its cost. That order almost always ends up cheaper and safer than jumping straight to a paid tool or a custom build.
I build and customize Sharetribe marketplaces for founders who've outgrown the template but aren't ready to leave the platform. If you're weighing the no-code-versus-custom question on your own marketplace, I'm happy to look at the specifics.
If you're mapping out a marketplace idea, my Fiverr gig, Upwork profile, or contact page has more on how I approach this.
This article was first published on Medium.
