Let’s talk about insurance—yeah, I know, not the sexiest topic in the startup world. But if your eyes glaze over every time someone brings up coverage limits or policy language, I’ve got news for you: you’re missing a huge opportunity to protect your business.

Mandatory reporting can be defined as “anyone required by law to report actual or suspected abuse and/or neglect.” It’s most often applied to vulnerable populations, including children, people with disabilities, and older adults.

I wish I could tell you that building a great trust and safety program means you’ll never have an incident. But here’s the truth: things will go wrong. And when they do, it’s how you respond that defines whether your platform recovers—or collapses.

Let’s get one thing straight—trust and safety isn’t a department. It’s a mindset. In Chapter 5 of Bulletproof Your Marketplace, I focus on what I consider one of the most critical components of a successful platform: creating and implementing your own trust and safety best practices.

If you’ve ever said, “We haven’t had any major issues yet,” I’ll stop you right there. That’s not a strategy—it’s luck. And luck runs out.

Let me cut straight to the point: if you’re not taking data privacy and security seriously, your platform won’t survive.

In Chapter 4 of Bulletproof Your Marketplace, I walk through why data protection isn’t just a compliance checkbox—it’s an existential issue. A single breach, an overlooked privacy policy, or a botched data handling protocol can tank your platform, alienate users, and land you in serious legal trouble.