Protecting Your FiveM Server Economy: Anti-Duplication & Refund Fraud Prevention

A broken economy kills servers faster than any other issue. When players discover duplication exploits or refund fraud methods, word spreads fast. Within days, your carefully balanced economy inflates beyond repair. Prevention is the only cure.

Common economy attack vectors

Understanding how exploiters break economies helps you defend against them. Most attacks target race conditions in inventory transfers, database desync during server restarts, or social engineering staff through fake refund requests.

• Race conditions: Rapidly dropping and picking up items to duplicate
• Restart exploits: Disconnecting during saves to rollback transactions
• Refund fraud: Claiming items were lost when they were transferred to alts
• Staff impersonation: Fake screenshots or manipulated evidence
• Database injection: Exploiting poorly sanitized inputs

Implementing transaction validation

Every item movement should be atomic and validated. Before adding items, verify the source. Before removing items, confirm the destination. Log both sides of every transaction with matching reference IDs.

-- Example: Validated item transfer
local function SafeTransfer(source, target, item, count)
    local txId = GenerateTransactionId()
    local sourceHas = GetItemCount(source, item)
    
    if sourceHas < count then
        LogSuspiciousActivity(source, 'transfer_insufficient', txId)
        return false
    end
    
    RemoveItem(source, item, count, txId)
    AddItem(target, item, count, txId)
    LogTransaction(txId, source, target, item, count)
    return true
end

Cross-referencing refund requests

Before approving any refund, verify the claim against server logs. LD Refund System automatically checks inventory history to confirm items existed and were actually lost. Manual systems should implement similar validation.

Setting up economy monitoring

Monitor aggregate metrics daily: total money in circulation, high-value item counts, and transaction volumes. Sudden spikes indicate exploits in progress. Set up automated alerts when metrics exceed normal ranges.

• Track daily money supply and flag increases over 5%
• Monitor rare item counts (shouldn't increase without admin spawns)
• Log all transactions over $100k for manual review
• Alert on players whose net worth increases 200%+ in 24 hours

Responding to economy breaches

When you detect an exploit, act fast. Identify affected players through transaction logs, calculate the economic damage, and decide on remediation. Options range from targeted rollbacks to server-wide money adjustments.

Economy protection is ongoing work. Build monitoring from day one, validate every transaction, and investigate anomalies immediately. Your server's long-term health depends on it.