Airbnb Has a Hidden-Camera Problem (theatlantic.com)

Airbnb says it's cracking down on hosts who record guests. But is it doing enough? From a report: Airbnb's rules allow cameras outdoors and in living rooms and common areas, but never in bathrooms or anywhere guests plan to sleep, including rooms with foldout beds. Starting in early 2018, Airbnb added another layer of disclosure: If hosts indicate they have cameras anywhere on their property, guests receive a pop-up informing them where the cameras are located and where they are aimed. To book the property, the guests must click "agree," indicating that they're aware of the cameras and consent to being filmed.

Of course, hosts have plenty of reason to train cameras on the homes they rent out to strangers. They can catch guests who attempt to steal, or who trash the place, or who initially say they're traveling alone, then show up to a property with five people. A representative for Airbnb's Trust & Safety communications department told me the company tries to filter out hosts who may attempt to surveil guests by matching them against sex-offender and felony databases. The company also uses risk scores to flag suspicious behavior, in addition to reviewing and booting hosts with consistently poor scores.

If a guest contacts Airbnb's Trust & Safety team with a complaint about a camera, employees offer new accommodations if necessary and open an investigation into the host. [...] But four guests who found cameras in their rentals told The Atlantic the company has inconsistently applied its own rules when investigating their claims, providing them with incorrect information and making recommendations that they say risked putting them in harm's way. "There have been super terrible examples of privacy violations by AirBnB hosts, e.g., people have found cameras hidden in alarm clocks in their bedrooms," wrote Jeff Bigham, a computer-science professor at Carnegie Mellon whose claim was initially denied after he reported cameras in his rental. "I feel like our experience is in some ways more insidious. If you find a truly hidden camera in your bedroom or bathroom, Airbnb will support you. If you find an undisclosed camera in the private living room, Airbnb will not support you."

Comments

Sharing economy at it's best

[Anonymous Coward]

This is an interesting aspect to the sharing economy that nobody talks about. With the industrialized versions of things like hotels and taxis and the like, the companies are subject to oversight and regulation that eliminates the fringes of society from causing problems. The sharing economy skirts those regulations and allows individuals to become competitive with the big companies in those areas, but with no oversight the people in the weird fringes of society become front and center.

What happens when someone releases online a video of a minor changing or in the bathroom? AirBnB would argue they're not responsible, but they enabled and could be considered an accessory. Does it bring the whole thing down?

It seems like all these sharing economy deals are constantly fighting the fringe of society's weird habits, all the way to the point where they die or they end up looking like the highly regulated industries they were trying to disrupt.

Re:Sharing economy at it's best

[fluffernutter]

We're just seeing the tip of the iceberg. We'll be so far down the rabbit hole praising seemingly inexpensive services that cut regulations it will be too late to go back when we figure out that those regulations are there for good reason forged by real live experience. Something like how we let Google and Facebook violate everyone's privacy and now that is very difficult to undo.

even the 'acceptable cameras' aren't

[vux984]

Airbnb's rules allow cameras outdoors and in living rooms and common areas, but never in bathrooms or anywhere guests plan to sleep, including rooms with foldout beds.

I don't really see how a camera in the living room is acceptable either.

Re:even the 'acceptable cameras' aren't

[vux984]

"Looking forward to hearing you complain when you let a bunch of randoms stay in your house while you're away and they end up trashing it "

I wouldn't let randos stay in my house while I was away. So I will never have that problem.

And if I did purchase a 2ndary property to rent out to randos, I'd furnish it accordingly, and insure it accordingly, and then charge accordingly. And I still wouldn't put a camera in the living room.

Airbnb

[ledow]

Gee, it's almost like it's a bad idea to use a middleman to rent out your home on a per-day basis to random strangers who you don't trust enough to not put cameras everywhere, and who don't want you to put cameras everywhere, and where the middleman says you can't put cameras everywhere without telling everyone what the cameras can't see and some places you can't put cameras at all, and then relying on some unspoken trust model to make it all work.

I can't see a problem with that business model *at all*.

Airbnb is one of the most ridiculous things I've ever heard of. It has nothing *but* advantages for the people renting those places out, and nothing *but* disadvantages for the person doing the renting.

you take the risk

[fermion]

All of these services cut costs by transferring risk to consumer. This is their business model, to circumvent decades of regulations, and provide value to those who want it. There is nothing wrong with this, except that generations of Americans have grown up being protected, and they continue to believe those protections are in place even when they clearly are not.

So, if you pay for the Hampton, there are a bunch of things that come with it. It is unlikely that you are going to be filmed having sex because the entire assets of the corporation are going to be up for grabs when some wiley lawyer takes the case.

On there other hand, there is no reason that an AirBnB renter has not to film you having sex, or that AirBnb has to prevent this. There renter is going to have minimal exposure, and AIrBnB has none as long as it makes a passing effort to say it does not support such actions.