Key Marketplace Risk Trends for 2026: Identity, Trust, and the Systems We Need to Build

Last week, leaders across the fraud and trust & safety ecosystem gathered in Austin for the Marketplace Risk Conference, one of the industry’s most important forums for discussing how platforms can address issues in an increasingly complex digital environment.

I led a session titled “Marketplace Trends for 2026,” where myself and fellow members of the Marketplace Risk Advisory Board examined the forces reshaping online platforms today.

Joining me in the discussion were:

• Laura Chen, Senior Product Policy Advisor at Google
• Abhay Antony, Director of Trust & Safety at Thumbtack
• Virgilia Pruthi, Senior Director of Product Management at Expedia Group

The panel explored how fraud, platform risk, and trust & safety operations are evolving, and what organizations must do to keep pace. It was apparent from the discussion that some recurring themes are top of mind for trust and safety leaders. Those include:

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Identity Is Becoming the Foundation of Trust & Safety

One of the clearest messages from the panel was that digital identity is rapidly becoming the foundation of effective trust and safety strategies.

For years, many organizations have built layered defenses using dozens of tools: device fingerprinting, behavioral analytics, payment checks, bot detection, content moderation systems, and more. But while these solutions address specific problems, they often operate in silos.

The result? Companies frequently have extensive data about activity, but limited understanding of the actual identities behind that activity.

Panelists emphasized that without a strong identity layer, organizations struggle to connect signals across the user lifecycle, from onboarding and account creation to transactions and post-incident investigations. As marketplaces continue to scale globally, identity is becoming the unifying element that enables trust signals to work together rather than in isolation.

Additionally, the group echoed the general feeling of most at the event were curious around the topic of AI and more specifically, what AI transformation for risk operations look like today and what they need to do.

Too Many Tools, Not Enough Identity Context

A constant challenge known by most trust and safety teams is the issue of tool proliferation. Over time, organizations often accumulate dozens of fraud and safety solutions, each implemented to address a specific threat or compliance requirement. But these tools rarely share a unified view of the user.

As one panelist noted, the result can feel like a poorly constructed attempt at risk management, where teams are constantly stitching together signals from disconnected systems.

This creates a structural problem: instead of building a coherent trust architecture, fraud leaders often spend their time closing gaps between tools. Without a reliable understanding of identity across the platform, even the most sophisticated solutions can struggle to produce clear outcomes.

Fraud Leaders Often Feel Like They're Playing Defense

The panel also surfaced a sentiment that struck deeply with most attendees: fraud and trust leaders frequently feel stuck in reactive mode. New attack vectors emerge constantly. Synthetic identities, account takeovers, AI-generated scams, and coordinated fraud rings are just among a handful of fraud types that are changing constantly. At the same time, internal priorities like product launches, growth initiatives, and new market expansions create new surfaces for risk.

This dynamic puts trust and safety teams in the position of patching vulnerabilities after they appear, rather than building proactive defenses. It means they’re back on their heels, rather than putting their expertise to work at operating in a proactive manner.

The panel discussed how shifting from reactive defense to strategic resilience requires more than just new tools. It requires stronger alignment between product, risk, and identity systems from the start.

Product Innovation Is Outpacing Safety Controls

Another critical challenge discussed was the pace of product innovation. Digital marketplaces are constantly evolving with new features, new interaction models, new ways for buyers and sellers to connect. But trust and safety controls often lag behind these changes.

Every new product surface, whether messaging features, AI-driven content, or new seller onboarding flows, creates opportunities for both growth and exploitation. As a result, fraudsters are often able to experiment faster than safety systems can adapt.

Panelists emphasized that trust and safety must be embedded earlier in the product development lifecycle so that controls evolve alongside new platform capabilities.

Trust & Safety Leaders Can Enable Safer Growth

Despite the challenges, the discussion ended on an optimistic note. Trust and safety teams are uniquely positioned to guide their organizations toward safer and more sustainable growth, but only if they are given the authority and tools to do so.

When trust leaders can influence identity architecture, risk strategy, and product design, they can help build systems that prevent abuse rather than constantly reacting to it.

In other words, trust and safety should not simply be viewed as a defensive function. Done well, it becomes a core enabler of platform growth. Identity, system design, and cross-functional collaboration will play a critical role in shaping the next generation of marketplace trust strategies.

And as the panel made clear, organizations that invest in these foundations today will be far better positioned to navigate the evolving risk landscape of 2026 and beyond.

Learn how Prove is helping marketplaces optimize operations with modern identity verification.