Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Airbnb Competitor Checks IDs: 'We Don't Want to Trade Security for Volume'

betabeat.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 99 posts

Re: Airbnb Competitor Checks IDs: 'We Don't Want to Trade Security for Volume'

#61

Post by klenwell »

r00fus wrote: post #37
Jun8 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Spot on observation. So, it is idiotic for the competitors to hit on AirBnB, since that is the biggest company in their budding niche and if that falls, well, nothing will remain. They should all try to minimize the damage to their biz model. EDIT: Let me elaborate: Firms compete among themselves in a given field and all's fair in this competition. However, when the whole industry is threatened, you should gather for…

I think roomorama.com's idea to increase vetting is a good start (along with black-list sharing, as nasty as that sounds to me)... but it's only a start. It doesn't, for example, deal with stolen identity. A recently stolen card+ID would bypass all of those protections, and easily lead to a quick buck for meth-lab operations (which is what EJ's situation sounds like it was).

Has anyone elaborated on the meth-lab scenario? I'd like to hear the economics on that. Wouldn't it be a lot of effort, planning, and personal risk for the bad guys to book the room through airbnb and then just trash it seemingly maliciously like they did?

If this really was a case of some kind of mobile meth-lab operation, shouldn't we expect a number of other cases like this going on with airbnb rentals?

I suspect one of the reasons that airbnb was slow to reimburse EJ is that details are so bizarre on the surface. I think the hotel industry conspiracy theories are absurd. But I am curious to find out what was really go on in that apartment for a week whatever it was.

Re: Airbnb Competitor Checks IDs: 'We Don't Want to Trade Security for Volume'

#62

Post by rexreed »

wccrawford wrote: post #5
mbreese wrote: post #3

Any of Airbnb's competitors are going to use this to their advantage. Rightfully so too... I didn't even know about Roomorama until this story. The biggest part of the story though was thrown in at the end: The harrowing story of the Airbnb user EJ prompted Ms. En Teo to reach out to her competitors in order to set a precedent for sharing information about sketchy users, so if she gets a report about misbehavior she…

They have to be careful, though, as this kind of thing can be considered libel or slander if not 100% true, and collusion even if it is true. Having an industry-wide blacklist will almost definitely run afoul of the law.

This happens all the time in the Vegas casino industry. Heck, I think all casinos share a "perp" database with photos and everything. Illegal? Definitely not.

Re: Airbnb Competitor Checks IDs: 'We Don't Want to Trade Security for Volume'

#63

Post by rmc »

wccrawford wrote: post #5
mbreese wrote: post #3

Any of Airbnb's competitors are going to use this to their advantage. Rightfully so too... I didn't even know about Roomorama until this story. The biggest part of the story though was thrown in at the end: The harrowing story of the Airbnb user EJ prompted Ms. En Teo to reach out to her competitors in order to set a precedent for sharing information about sketchy users, so if she gets a report about misbehavior she…

They have to be careful, though, as this kind of thing can be considered libel or slander if not 100% true, and collusion even if it is true. Having an industry-wide blacklist will almost definitely run afoul of the law.

And Data Protection laws

Re: Airbnb Competitor Checks IDs: 'We Don't Want to Trade Security for Volume'

#64

Post by starwed »

tokenadult wrote: post #32
wccrawford wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have to be careful, though, as this kind of thing can be considered libel or slander if not 100% true, and collusion even if it is true. Having an industry-wide blacklist will almost definitely run afoul of the law.

Landlords do this routinely. The last time I signed a new housing lease, part of the lease agreement was an agreement to allow the state association of landlords to share data about my history as a renter. Since I have a clean history, no problem. If I'm ever in a position to rent out housing units, I sure don't want to rent them out to people who have a KNOWN propensity to trash them. Nor do I want to rent to a rent…

Hmm, that must be a thing that varies by state -- I've never heard of such a provision in KY.

Re: Airbnb Competitor Checks IDs: 'We Don't Want to Trade Security for Volume'

#65

Post by starwed »

ghshephard wrote: post #7
wccrawford wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have to be careful, though, as this kind of thing can be considered libel or slander if not 100% true, and collusion even if it is true. Having an industry-wide blacklist will almost definitely run afoul of the law.

Bars do this all the time in areas where there are problems - they scan your ID and then share the information with other bars, particularly if you get booted. In the United States, if you make a good faith claim about someone, it's pretty hard to win a libel suit, and, I suspect, it would be even harder to claim that grading an individual rises to the level of slander/libel, particularly if you provide a mechanism t…

While your general point still stands, I don't think the existence of credit rating agencies proves much. Even if they would otherwise have been liable, there fundamental utility would, I'm sure, have led to specific legal exemptions.

As it stands, the operation of such agencies is subject to a lot of specific regulation. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Credit_bureau#United_States

Re: Airbnb Competitor Checks IDs: 'We Don't Want to Trade Security for Volume'

#66

Post by starwed »

r00fus wrote: post #13
almightygod wrote: post #4

When the major media picks up this whole rent-a-room-to-a-stranger-fiasco the bad guys will be AirBNB and the good guys will be the roomorama (and other competitors that capitalize on it)

No, when mass media picks it up, the hotel industry will be made to look like knights in shining armor... the hotel lobby is big and powerful and media is corrupt. AirBnB's fiasco is not a long-term benefit for their direct competitors either.

I don't see how they could bend this particular story that way. You'd have to have a contrasting narrative making hotels out to be superior -- but here it was the property owner that got screwed.

Re: Airbnb Competitor Checks IDs: 'We Don't Want to Trade Security for Volume'

#67

Post by mingyeow »

hugh3 wrote: post #40
pseudonym wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is easily the silliest thing I've heard about this so far, and this is after reading AirBnB's PR statement. If they fuck this up, they won't "come out stronger", they'll come out with a sufficiently heavy PR backlash that people won't use them anymore. And that'll be that. As it stands now, the only thing people are hearing are negative things about AirBnB, and unless they take huge steps to fix that, there's go…

I think we're over-estimating how big and widespread this story is, because it's all over the HN front page. Sure, plenty of people are going to hear about it and it's gonna be damaging for airbnb. But a whole lot of people aren't going to hear about it because they don't read HN or the Financial Times. It's bad for airbnb, but shouldn't be a killer. From my point of view, my only surprise is that it didn't happen so…

they are lucky this is happening at the same time as the US debt ceiling. on a slower news cycle, this would have been on the nytimes front page

Re: Airbnb Competitor Checks IDs: 'We Don't Want to Trade Security for Volume'

#68

Post by Pointsly »

mbreese wrote: post #3

Any of Airbnb's competitors are going to use this to their advantage. Rightfully so too... I didn't even know about Roomorama until this story. The biggest part of the story though was thrown in at the end: The harrowing story of the Airbnb user EJ prompted Ms. En Teo to reach out to her competitors in order to set a precedent for sharing information about sketchy users, so if she gets a report about misbehavior she…

Am I the only one who doesn't think this is that big of a deal for AirBnB?

Re: Airbnb Competitor Checks IDs: 'We Don't Want to Trade Security for Volume'

#69

Post by msg »

pak wrote: post #60
cubix wrote: post #58

I'm surprised that scanning IDs is much of a deterrent. If would-be thieves are going to the trouble of booking rooms on AirBNB and the like, they are obviously more than casual criminals, and probably fairly technically adept ones at that. Taking the next logical step to Photoshop the image doesn't seem like much of an obstacle for someone so motivated.

Indeed, if Nigerian 419 scammers have already picked up photoshopping IDs [1], you can imagine what a low barrier this will be. The real question is if you can verify the ID electronically from the image, and the answer will generally be no. [1] http://www.419eater.com/html/hall_of_shame4.htm

You might be able to use Hany Farid's work on doctored photographs to show they've been tampered with. See, eg, this interesting transcript of his Nova appearance.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/tech/hany-farid.html

Steganography/image manipulation is an arms race but you'll keep the low end fake IDs out. At some point in the race master criminals are going to go for higher value targets than random apartments on AirBnB. And... problem solved.

Re: Airbnb Competitor Checks IDs: 'We Don't Want to Trade Security for Volume'

#70

Post by btilly »

gcb wrote: post #43
ghshephard wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bars do this all the time in areas where there are problems - they scan your ID and then share the information with other bars, particularly if you get booted. In the United States, if you make a good faith claim about someone, it's pretty hard to win a libel suit, and, I suspect, it would be even harder to claim that grading an individual rises to the level of slander/libel, particularly if you provide a mechanism t…

the sites just have to remember to put that sign "we reserve the right to refuse service to anyone" and they are covered.

Put up that sign and then refuse service to blacks, and you're not fine.

Put up that sign, implement the described policy, receive disproportionate numbers of complaints about blacks (because landlords are racist?), enforce the described policy equally irrespective of race, and you are walking a fine line. You could be sued for that and might not be fine.

Post reply on HN