Prohibited & acceptable use

FreelancerPeople is a premium marketplace where buyers and sellers meet to scope, deliver, and pay for real professional work. This Prohibited & Acceptable Use Policy explains what you may and may not do on the platform — across packaged services we call SERVEs, custom fixed-price and weekly-billed hourly contracts, messaging, profiles, reviews, and every other surface we operate. It applies to everyone: buyers, sellers, visitors, and anyone acting on their behalf.

This policy works together with our Terms of Use, Privacy Policy, Community Guidelines, IP & Copyright Policy, and Payment Terms. Where a defined term is used here, it carries the meaning given in the Terms of Use. By creating an account or using FreelancerPeople, you agree to keep your activity within the boundaries described below. If you are unsure whether something is allowed, treat it as not allowed until you ask our Support team.

1. What acceptable use means

Acceptable use means using FreelancerPeople for genuine, lawful freelance work — offering or buying skills, delivering what was agreed, communicating honestly, and paying through the platform. Buyers fund orders into 100% escrow, where money is held safely until delivery is made and the review window passes; sellers receive their payout after a short clearance window once work is accepted. Everything in this policy is designed to protect that exchange and the people on both sides of it.

Beyond the specific prohibitions listed in this document, the following baseline expectations apply at all times:

• Be truthful about who you are, what you can do, and what you are delivering.
• Keep your work, your communications, and your payments on the platform, where escrow and the Resolution Center can protect you.
• Respect other people, their rights, their data, and their property.
• Comply with the laws that apply to you and to the work being performed.

This list is illustrative, not exhaustive. Our Trust & Safety team may treat conduct that undermines the safety, integrity, or trust of the marketplace as a violation even if it is not spelled out word-for-word below.

2. Illegal goods, services & activity

You may not use FreelancerPeople to offer, request, advertise, facilitate, or pay for anything that is illegal where you are, where the other party is, or where the work will be used. The marketplace is for lawful professional services only, and an order does not become legitimate simply because it is dressed up as a SERVE or a custom contract.

Prohibited activity includes, without limitation:

• Trade in regulated, controlled, or prohibited goods — including weapons, drugs and other controlled substances, counterfeit items, and stolen property.
• Services that enable illegal acts, such as forging documents, producing fake identification or credentials, or helping someone evade law enforcement.
• Sexual services, exploitation, or any content or service involving minors.
• Work that violates export controls, gambling laws, or any other applicable regulation.

If you are asked to perform something unlawful, decline and report it. We cooperate with valid legal requests and may preserve and disclose information where required by law.

3. Fraud, scams & misrepresentation

Honesty is the foundation of escrow. You may not deceive another user, our teams, or the platform itself. Fraud and misrepresentation cover any attempt to obtain money, work, access, or advantage through false statements, fake materials, or hidden intentions.

The following are prohibited:

• Misrepresenting your identity, location, skills, experience, qualifications, or portfolio — including passing off work you did not create as your own.
• Advertising a SERVE or contract you have no intention or ability to deliver, or "bait-and-switch" tactics that change the scope or price after an order is funded.
• Filing false delivery claims, false disputes, or false refund requests, or manipulating the order timeline to trigger or avoid an automatic outcome.
• Using stolen, unauthorized, or fraudulent payment methods, or attempting chargeback fraud after receiving work.
• Phishing, impersonating FreelancerPeople staff, or tricking someone into revealing passwords, codes, or wallet or payout details.

Disputes about whether work met what was agreed belong in the Resolution Center; deception to win a dispute is itself a serious violation.

4. Circumventing the platform

FreelancerPeople only works because money moves through escrow and conversations stay on the platform — that is what makes our buyer protection, payout protection, and the Resolution Center possible. Taking a relationship that began here off the platform to avoid those protections, or to avoid the platform fee shown before you confirm an order, is prohibited.

You may not:

• Solicit or arrange payment outside the platform — for example by asking a buyer to pay by bank transfer, third-party payment app, gift card, cryptocurrency, or any off-platform method for work that originated on FreelancerPeople.
• Share or request personal contact details — phone numbers, personal email addresses, external messaging handles, or links intended to move the conversation off-platform — in order to evade the marketplace before an order or contract is in place.
• Encourage another user to cancel, refund, or close an order so it can be completed off-platform.
• Use a SERVE, custom offer, or message to advertise a competing off-platform arrangement.

Sharing files, briefs, or reference links that are a normal part of doing the agreed work is fine. The line is intent: contact details exchanged to deliver an order are acceptable; contact details exchanged to escape escrow and fees are not. When in doubt, keep it on-platform — that is also the only way our protections apply.

5. Adult, violent, hateful & harassing content

FreelancerPeople is a professional environment, and profiles, SERVEs, portfolios, messages, and reviews must reflect that. You may not post, request, or deliver content that is sexually explicit, gratuitously violent, or designed to demean or endanger others.

Prohibited content and conduct include:

• Pornographic or sexually explicit material, and any sexual content involving minors, which is reported to the appropriate authorities without exception.
• Content that praises, incites, or provides instructions for violence, terrorism, or self-harm.
• Hate speech or content that attacks, dehumanizes, or promotes discrimination against people based on protected characteristics such as race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, gender, sexual orientation, disability, or age.
• Harassment, bullying, threats, stalking, doxxing, or sustained unwanted contact directed at any user or member of our teams.

Our Marketplace Team reviews listings and content, and our Trust & Safety team acts on harassment and safety reports. Treat every person you encounter here with professional respect.

6. Intellectual-property infringement

You must own or have the right to use everything you upload, sell, or deliver, and you must respect other people's rights in the same way. Infringing intellectual property harms creators and exposes buyers to risk down the line.

The following are not allowed:

• Selling, delivering, or distributing copyrighted work, trademarks, software, fonts, stock assets, or other protected material without the necessary license or permission.
• Passing off someone else's portfolio, samples, or case studies as your own.
• Offering services whose purpose is to infringe — for example removing watermarks or DRM, or producing knock-offs of protected brands.
• Falsely claiming ownership of, or rights to, deliverables you did not create.

Rights holders can submit infringement and takedown notices under our IP & Copyright Policy, and our Trust & Safety team will act on valid claims, including by removing content and disabling repeat-infringer accounts.

7. Malware, hacking & security abuse

You may not use FreelancerPeople to compromise systems, devices, or data — whether ours, another user's, or a third party's. Security-related services are only acceptable when they are clearly lawful, authorized, and conducted with the consent of the system owner.

Prohibited activity includes:

• Creating, distributing, or delivering malware, ransomware, spyware, keyloggers, or other malicious code.
• Offering or buying hacking, account-takeover, credential-cracking, DDoS, or unauthorized-access services.
• Probing, scanning, or testing the security of the FreelancerPeople platform without our prior written permission, or attempting to bypass authentication, rate limits, or KYC verification.
• Interfering with the normal operation of the platform, including scraping at scale, overloading our systems, or reverse-engineering our services.

If you discover a genuine security vulnerability in FreelancerPeople, do not exploit it — report it responsibly to our Support team so it can reach the right people.

8. Spam & unsolicited promotion

Messaging on FreelancerPeople exists so buyers and sellers can scope and deliver real work, not to broadcast promotions. To protect that, sellers can only message a buyer after the buyer has connected first — by starting a conversation or placing an order — and even then communication must stay relevant to the work.

You may not:

• Send bulk, repetitive, or unsolicited messages, offers, or invitations.
• Use profiles, SERVE descriptions, reviews, or messages to advertise unrelated products, external sites, referral schemes, or off-platform services.
• Post misleading, keyword-stuffed, or deceptive listings designed to game search rather than describe a real service.
• Harvest user information for the purpose of marketing or outreach.

Genuine, relevant communication about an order or a buyer's stated need is welcome; everything that treats other users as a mailing list is not.

9. Account abuse, fake reviews & rating manipulation

Reputation on FreelancerPeople — ratings, reviews, completed projects, and seller levels — must be earned through real work. Manipulating that signal deceives buyers and is treated as a serious violation.

The following are prohibited:

• Creating multiple or fake accounts, or operating an account on behalf of someone who is banned or hidden.
• Placing fake or self-funded orders, or coordinating orders solely to inflate metrics, levels, or rankings.
• Posting, soliciting, exchanging, or paying for false, incentivized, or retaliatory reviews and ratings.
• Pressuring, threatening, or bribing a buyer to leave, change, or remove a review, or to withdraw a dispute.
• Sharing, selling, buying, or transferring accounts, or logging into an account you are not authorized to use.

Our Trust & Safety team uses signals across the platform to detect manipulation, and may remove fraudulent reviews, reset affected metrics, and restrict the accounts involved.

10. Attempts to evade fees

FreelancerPeople charges a platform fee, shown clearly before you confirm an order. Trying to avoid those fees undermines the protections they fund.

You may not:

• Move part or all of an order off-platform to avoid the fee, or split a single engagement into off-platform components.
• Understate the true price of work in a SERVE or custom offer and collect the balance elsewhere.
• Misuse refunds, cancellations, or disputes to recover or sidestep platform charges after work has been delivered.
• Misrepresent the scope or nature of work to qualify for pricing or plan benefits you are not entitled to.

Fee evasion is a form of platform circumvention and is handled accordingly by our Trust & Safety and Payment Teams. Questions about how a charge is calculated should go to our Support team.

11. Money laundering & sanctioned activity

FreelancerPeople must not be used to move, disguise, or legitimize the proceeds of crime, or to transact with sanctioned parties. Our wallet, escrow, and payout systems exist to pay for real work, not to process value unrelated to genuine services.

Prohibited activity includes:

• Using orders, the buyer wallet, or seller payouts to layer or launder funds, or to transfer value that does not correspond to real work delivered.
• Structuring transactions to disguise their source, destination, or purpose.
• Transacting on behalf of, or providing services to, individuals, entities, or regions subject to applicable sanctions or trade restrictions.
• Refusing or falsifying KYC identity verification, which is required before withdrawals can be released.

Our Payment Team may place holds on funds, decline payouts, and require additional verification to comply with financial-crime and sanctions obligations, and our Trust & Safety team may suspend accounts where activity raises these concerns.

12. Misuse of personal data

You will often receive personal information in the course of an order — a brief, contact details to deliver work, or files containing other people's data. You may use that information only for the order it relates to, and you must protect it.

You may not:

• Collect, store, share, sell, or process another user's personal data beyond what is necessary to deliver the agreed work.
• Use information gathered on the platform for marketing, profiling, or any unrelated purpose without a lawful basis and consent.
• Expose, leak, or publish another person's private information, including doxxing.
• Ignore your own legal obligations as a data controller or processor where the work involves handling personal data.

How FreelancerPeople itself handles your information is described in our Privacy Policy. Treat data entrusted to you with the same care you would expect for your own.

13. How violations are handled & enforced

Our Trust & Safety team is responsible for enforcing this policy. We assess reports and signals in context, weighing the severity of the conduct, its impact on others, intent, and any history. Because situations differ, we apply a proportionate response rather than a single fixed penalty.

Depending on the circumstances, action may include:

• A warning, content removal, or removal of a SERVE, listing, message, or review by our Trust & Safety or Marketplace Teams.
• Limits on features, hidden listings, or removal of manipulated ratings, reviews, or seller-level progress.
• Holds, reversals, or withheld payouts applied by our Payment Team where money is involved, consistent with our Payment Terms and Refund & Cancellation Policy.
• Temporary suspension or permanent closure of one or more accounts for serious or repeated violations.
• Referral to law enforcement or regulators, and preservation or disclosure of information, where the law requires it.

Disputes about whether a delivery met what was agreed are resolved separately through the Resolution Center. If you believe an enforcement action was a mistake, you can ask our Support team to review it.

14. How to report a violation

If you see something on FreelancerPeople that breaks this policy, tell us. Reports from users are one of the most effective ways our Trust & Safety team finds and stops abuse, and acting early protects everyone.

• Use the report option available on profiles, SERVEs, and messages where it appears.
• For anything urgent or involving safety, fraud, or financial-crime concerns, contact our Support team directly.
• Rights holders should file infringement notices under the IP & Copyright Policy.
• Disagreements about a specific order or delivery should be raised in the Resolution Center.

Please include enough detail to act on — what happened, who was involved, and any links or references. Submitting knowingly false reports to harm another user is itself a violation. We do not tolerate retaliation against people who report concerns in good faith.

15. Changes to this policy

As the marketplace and the law evolve, we may update this Prohibited & Acceptable Use Policy. When we make material changes, we will update the date shown at the top of this page and, where appropriate, notify users. Your continued use of FreelancerPeople after an update means you accept the revised policy, so we encourage you to review it from time to time alongside the other documents it references.

16. Questions & contact

If anything here is unclear, or you are not sure whether a service or request is allowed, please reach out before you proceed. Our Support team handles account and general questions; our Trust & Safety team handles safety, fraud, and policy-enforcement matters; our Payment Team handles questions about holds, refunds, and payouts; and the Resolution Center handles disputes about specific orders.

You can get in touch any time through our Contact page. We would rather answer a question early than resolve a problem later.