Litigation, Trust & Risk Counsel

Whatnot•San Francisco, CA

1d•$225,000 - $265,000•Hybrid

About The Position

The Legal team protects the platform, enables the business to move fast, and keeps Whatnot ahead of the legal risk that comes with hypergrowth. We're looking for a litigation attorney who understands how platform enforcement decisions and consumer complaints become legal disputes. As our Litigation and Trust & Risk Counsel, you'll manage active disputes matters across our growing docket while serving as the embedded legal advisor to our Trust & Risk and Customer Support teams. You'll report to our Head of Litigation and sit at the operational heart of our legal function — translating Whatnot's real-time enforcement actions into defensible legal positions and keeping our disputes docket moving. There's no playbook for what we're doing — you'll be creating the processes and infrastructure as we go. That means real ownership early, but it also means you need to be comfortable operating with ambiguity and creating structure where none exists yet. This role has real room to grow as our disputes and legal operations functions mature.

Requirements

5+ years of legal experience
A J.D. degree, and active bar membership in at least one US state.
5+ years of litigation experience, with prior in-house experience owning a high-volume docket strongly preferred.
Ideally you have spent time in-house at a tech platform, marketplace, or consumer-facing company, though complex commercial or product liability litigation experience at a large law firm is also a plus.
Fluency in trust, safety, and risk operations. You have first-hand experience with platform enforcement actions and understand how these decisions are made and how they create legal exposure downstream. New situations surface every day that no policy fully anticipates — good judgment in the grey matters more than waiting for the perfect rule.
Consumer dispute expertise. You have handled high-volume consumer-facing disputes and understand balancing customer experience with keeping the platform trustworthy. Platform liability knowledge (Section 230) and IP/DMCA experience a plus.
Strong oral and written communication skills. You understand that all external communication reflects the company and have high standards for your own work product and a keen attention to detail. You have the ability to tailor tone and content to the audience at hand – whether that is a junior Whatnot employee, senior executive partner, external regulator, or federal court.
Real intellectual curiosity. You ask why a pattern is emerging in the docket before anyone asks you to, and you're energized by novel legal questions — not slowed down by them.
Sharp judgment about what to escalate and what to handle — you don't over-lawyer routine matters, you don't under-escalate real risks, and you can tell the difference at speed.
Demonstrated AI tool fluency. You have used AI tools (e.g., GC AI, Claude CoWork, or Glean) to do real legal work and are excited to have the opportunity to leverage these tools to improve the efficiency, consistency, and quality of our work.
Genuine interest in Whatnot. You’ve used the app (or are excited to), and you get what it means to support a two-sided marketplace community.

Nice To Haves

Two-sided marketplace experience. Experience in a two-sided or multi-sided marketplace, balancing buyer and seller interests
Fraud and trust & safety investigation background. You have investigated fraud or platform abuse concerns (e.g., payments fraud, account takeover, marketplace abuse) and know how to turn investigative findings into legal action.
International consumer protection knowledge. You're familiar with consumer protection frameworks outside the US (UK, EU, Australia), which will matter as Whatnot's disputes docket grows across its global hubs.

Responsibilities

Manage a docket of active litigation and arbitration matters involving Whatnot sellers and buyers end-to-end: driving litigation and resolution strategy, coordinating with outside counsel, reviewing briefs and submissions, and keeping matters moving under the supervision of our Head of Litigation.
Analyze demand letters and state AG complaints and draft clear, consistent, and confident responses, leveraging technology to improve efficiency and response time.
Own IP/DMCA takedown workflow, including scaling process as Whatnot grows, and working closely with our Trust & Risk teams to implement related enforcement actions.
Manage the legal hold process, including identifying matters, drafting legal holds, managing tracking, and coordinating with internal stakeholders on execution.
Work with our Trust & Risk Lead to translate investigation outputs into legal positions and arguments and further hone our investigation process.
Use AI tools (such as Claude CoWork, Glean, GC AI) to drive efficiency, build templates and workflows, and create a safety net so matters don’t get missed.
Identify systemic issues in the docket and identify business-oriented solutions — you read patterns, not just individual matters, and you bring solutions not just observations.
Build the playbooks, escalation frameworks, and response templates that don't exist yet — you're energized by creating structure, not just working within it.
Serve as the real-time legal advisor and partner to our Trust & Risk and Customer Support teams on account enforcement decisions with legal exposure, including seller bans, payout holds, offboarding actions, and account restrictions.
Partner with our Trust & Risk, Customer Support, and Communications teams to proactively update user communications to improve customer experience and minimize legal risk.
Develop complete and accurate documentation of enforcement decisions, closing the gap between operational actions and defensible legal positions.
Assess ongoing areas of risk surfacing through Trust & Risk and Customer Support and work collaboratively with those teams to implement process improvements that reduce downstream legal exposure.
Support engagement with regulators and legislators on safety issues
Investigate fraud concerns on the Whatnot platform and communicate legal demands as needed

Benefits

Generous Holiday and Time off Policy
Health Insurance options including Medical, Dental, Vision
Work From Home Support
Home office setup allowance
Monthly allowance for cell phone and internet
Care benefits
Monthly allowance for wellness
Annual allowance towards Childcare
Lifetime benefit for family planning, such as adoption or fertility expenses
Retirement; 401k offering for Traditional and Roth accounts in the US (employer match up to 4% of base salary) and Pension plans internationally
Monthly allowance to dogfood the app
16 weeks of paid parental leave + one month gradual return to work company leave allowances run concurrently with country leave requirements which take precedence.