Last updated 6 September 2026
Orders were placed in my account without my permission
Our system never places orders on its own. Every order comes from a user action, and every operation is recorded in the activity logs. If you see an order you do not recognise, check those logs first, then check with your broker. As a safety step, change your trading platform password, your AutoTrader Web login password, and your API key.
When this happens
- 1 The account is operated by more than one user, and there was miscommunication.
- 2 The trader placed a wrong order in the heat of trading and forgot it.
- 3 A keypress placed an order on the Trade screen that the trader did not mean to send. Placing an order from the keyboard now opens a confirmation box first.
- 4 A badly written automation code placed an unexpected order (for example, it passed the wrong symbol or quantity).
- 5 The broker's Risk team or RMS system placed the order due to a margin shortfall or intraday square-off.
- 6 The broker's staff entered a manual order as part of their Call & Trade service, sometimes with a data-entry mistake on the account number.
The way we have built our system, an outsider cannot perform any activity in your trading accounts. Still, on rare occasions, we get this question: “Can you please check, I did not place this order?”
The first thing to understand is that every action our system runs is the result of a user’s own action. For example, the user places orders manually, or the user’s automated strategy places orders. Our system is very secure. You can read more in the security concerns article.
Who can place an order in your account
An order can only reach your account through an authorized path:
| How the order was placed | Requires |
|---|---|
| User places orders manually from the AutoTrader Web website | AutoTrader Web login credentials |
| Automated strategies, or manual orders via our Excel tools | AutoTrader Web API key |
| User places orders directly from the broker’s trading platform | Your stock broker’s trading platform login credentials |
How to investigate
- If you do automated trading, check all of your strategy logs first.
- If the order came from the Trade screen, check whether it was placed by accident. Pressing Enter on that screen places an order, and the cursor is left in the price box after you pick a symbol. This now asks you to confirm first, so see why you have to confirm an order placed with the Enter key.
- AutoTrader Web is fully transparent. Every operation is tracked in the activity logs. This is the best place to find every operation done from AutoTrader Web.
- Remember that your account can also be accessed directly from your broker’s trading platform. So an order could have been placed there.
- If you cannot find anything in the logs, check with your stock broker. Most brokers keep logs of account activity. Ask them for details of all orders placed on that day.
- Look for user login messages in the activity logs.
- AutoTrader Web and the trading systems of most top brokers are very safe. Unless your credentials fell into someone else’s hands, an outsider cannot place an order in your account.
- As a precaution, immediately change your trading platform password, your AutoTrader Web login password, and your API key.
Many other things can cause this. But if it happens due to a bug in AutoTrader Web, you will be able to find it using our activity logs, which give you complete transparency.
