Last week, my SaaS product, Kirkify, was permanently banned by our payment processor, Creem. To make matters worse, my account balance was frozen for 90 days.
The cause wasn’t fraud, and it wasn’t money laundering. It was a simple database configuration vulnerability—one that I missed, and one that someone found and posted on a dark web forum.
Despite detecting the issue and patching it within six hours, performing a full architectural migration, and writing a ten-page appeal, the outcome was final: Creem stated that due to the involvement of card networks and regulatory bodies, they could no longer serve us.
I am sharing a complete post-mortem of this event because the trap I fell into is one that many indie developers are walking right now.
01 The Background: What is Kirkify?
Kirkify is an AI face-swapping tool I built. It uses Replicate to run models and charges users on a subscription or pay-per-use basis.
The tech stack was a classic indie developer combination:
- Frontend: Next.js
- Database: Supabase (PostgreSQL)
- Payments: Creem (A Merchant of Record (MoR), similar to Stripe, but handling global tax and compliance)
- AI Inference: Replicate (API-based, no need to manage GPUs)
- CDN: Cloudflare R2
The product had been running for a few months with steady paying users and daily orders. While the monthly revenue wasn’t massive, it was fully automated—a standard stream of passive income.
A quick note on Creem: For indie developers, platforms like Creem are a godsend. They handle global taxes, compliance (like VAT in different countries), and refunds. Basically, you focus on building, and they handle the “dirty work” of not going to jail for tax evasion.
Everything was going perfectly until February 22nd.
02 One Database Config, The Entire Chain Explodes
That day, I received a notification. Someone had posted on a notorious data breach forum: “Kirkify.net Database Leaked Download.”
My first reaction was denial. I use Supabase. Doesn’t it have RLS (Row-Level Security)?
After checking, panic set in. Out of my 10 database tables, most did not have RLS enabled.
Here is a critical design feature of Supabase you must know: Its PostgreSQL database exposes a public REST API via PostgREST. If you do not configure RLS policies for your tables, that API allows anyone to query all your user data anonymously.
The leaked data included:
- User emails, names, and Google OAuth IDs.
- Creem customer IDs, subscription IDs, and status.
- Credit balances and transaction history.
- Referral codes and invite relationships.
The only good news was that no credit card information was leaked. Because payments go through Creem, I never stored card numbers or CVVs in my database.
However, to Creem, that didn’t matter. From their perspective, my database was being shopped around the dark web.
📍 A Crucial Misconception: Many indie developers think, “I’m using Supabase, so I’m safe.” This is false. Supabase gives you the gun, but you have to load the bullets. RLS is not enabled by default. You must manually configure it for every single table you create.
03 The 6-Hour Emergency FixOnce I realized the scope, my AI assistant and I immediately went into emergency patch mode.
Phase 1: The RLS Blanket Patch (Completed within 24 hours)
I applied Row-Level Security to all 10 tables. For example:
| Table | Policy |
| billing_customers | Users can only read/write their own record. |
| billing_subscriptions | Users can only read their own record. |
| credit_balances | Users can read their own; writes only via backend. |
| video_predictions | Users can only view their own predictions. |
Phase 2: Total Data Migration
Patching RLS wasn’t enough. The Supabase architecture inherently carries this risk—as long as you use PostgREST, you are one mistake away from exposure.
I decided to migrate completely:
- Database: Supabase PostgreSQL
→→Cloudflare D1 (SQLite-based, no public API). - Auth: Supabase Auth
→→Self-hosted JWT + HttpOnly Cookies. - Deployment: Vercel
→→Cloudflare Pages + Workers.
The migration took less than two weeks. I redesigned the schema for 11 tables, rewrote 25 API routes, and built the authentication system from scratch.
Honestly, this migration could be a blog post on its own. My AI assistant was invaluable here, generating D1 schemas and rewriting the data access layer. I handled the architectural decisions and testing. Two years ago, this would have been impossible for a solo dev; now, it’s just part of the workflow.
Before vs. After Migration:
- Before: Database had a public REST API
→→One config error leads to total exposure. - After: D1 has no public API
→→This specific vulnerability is architecturally impossible.
04 The Ten-Page Appeal: All Effort, Zero Result
After Creem sent the investigation email, I wrote an exhaustive, incredibly detailed response:
- What leaked: A table-by-table breakdown of exposed fields.
- What didn’t leak: Explicit confirmation that no credit card data existed.
- How it was fixed: Screenshots of the RLS patch and details of the architectural migration.
- Timeline: Proving detection and containment within a few hours.
Creem’s AI support agent, “Creemie,” replied asking for my Store ID and proof of security configuration. I sent a second, even more detailed follow-up with RLS policy tables and migration progress reports.
Then, the final reply arrived:
“While we understand that configuration errors can occur and acknowledge your team’s swift action, regrettably, we cannot continue to support your business on the Creem platform.”
“Given the nature of the incident, card networks and regulatory bodies have initiated a review.”
“Your balance has been frozen for 90 days.”
You can do everything right in the aftermath, but the outcome remains unchanged.
05 Three Hard Truths This Taught Me
1. Supabase RLS is a Ticking Time Bomb
This isn’t to bash Supabase. It genuinely lowers the barrier to entry for backend development.
But, PostgREST exposing a public API plus RLS being off by default equals a loaded gun pointed at every indie developer’s foot.
Go check your Supabase project right now. Is RLS enabled on every table? Are the policies correct? If you cannot answer immediately, you are in the same position I was in two months ago.
2. You Have Zero Negotiation Power in Payment Platform Compliance
Creem’s reply was polite but absolute. This wasn’t a bug to be fixed; it was a compliance catastrophe.
Card networks (Visa, Mastercard) mandate investigations upon receiving data breach reports. To protect themselves, payment processors must cut ties with the offending entity.
Your speed of repair does not matter. Your attitude does not matter. They are protecting the reputation of the entire payment network, not your specific business.
The logic is the same for Stripe, PayPal, or LemonSqueezy. To them, you are not a “diligent indie developer”; you are a liability.
I understand Creem’s decision. As an MoR, if Visa sees a breach associated with a Creem merchant, Creem gets audited next. It makes perfect business sense.
But understanding it doesn’t change the fact that your revenue just hit zero.
3. An Indie Developer’s Biggest Risk is Not Lack of Users, but Platform Dependency
You can migrate databases. You can rewrite code. But if your payment channel is severed, your business is dead.
And you cannot control this. Every third-party platform you rely on has the right to terminate your service at any time, for any reason.
- Supabase can ban you.
- Creem/Stripe can freeze you.
- Vercel can shut you down.
- Google OAuth can rate-limit you.
You think you are building a startup, but really, you are just renting a stall in someone else’s mall.
06 What Now?
Kirkify is not dead.
The database has migrated to Cloudflare D1, auth is self-hosted, and deployment is on Cloudflare Workers. Architecturally, it is ten times safer than before.
Regarding payments, I am integrating a new payment processor. The funds held by Creem will be released after the 90-day freeze.
More importantly, my mindset has shifted.
Previously, I believed an indie developer’s core skill was “shipping products fast.”
Now, I believe the core skill is the ability to rebuild within 48 hours if any platform nukes you.
It’s not about avoiding third-party services; it’s about ensuring every third-party service can be replaced within a week.
Writing this, I look back at two months ago when I was writing tutorials on “How to use AI to improve efficiency.” Today, I was using AI to patch database vulnerabilities, draft compliance appeals, and execute infrastructure migrations.
This is the reality of being an indie developer. Nothing is stable. The ability to rebuild from scratch is your only true moat.
Found this useful? Share it with a developer friend who uses Supabase. It might save them from a massive disaster.
