Verify ID now required for all travelers?

[Ramona11]

Has anyone else run up against a requirement to use Verify ID no matter who you are booking with? For security reasons I do not with to keep my ocs on file and link my airbnb profile with my fb page. So I have not been able to book with any hosts now, and the hosts are not the ones imposing the requirement. as a Super Host myself, I think this is going to really hurt my business. Anyone know anything? Thanks!

[Lesley357]

I have booked with AirBnB several times in last 12 months, but never been asked for photo ID before.  I don't have a photo ID to use, so cannot complete my booking.  Won't be using them again 😞

[Sherry325]

I'm so angry! I tried to get them to remove my ID and they told me I had to wait 90 days from my last booking. Honestly, that even seems illegal to me. If I didn't already have reservations that I need to keep, I would delete my whole account. And I will as soon as I have completed my stays. This sucks!!

[Eileen305]

Fuming,  I have been using it for about three years now ! I do not have a passport or a driving license. ! 

[Deborah934]

I've been asked by a host to provide government I'd to my profile..Im not happy with this..it's my data that I don't want to be risked shared with goodness knows who!

[Kiran73]

Having used the service for over two years in multiple countries, with nothing but positive reviews both ways to reflect those experiences, I was a bit miffed when the verification screen showed up. 

There is absolutely no way I am supplying that information, paired with an image of myself, for a company to keep on file forever or further on sell it to third parties that pay for it, let alone the risks in the data being maliciously compromised. 

My phone number is verified, the host can inspect it when I arrive or I am happy to e-mail the host a copy of the ID with the sensitive numbers blocked out. 

It will be a shame that I'll miss out on some amazing places to stay during my visits, but I'll make the compromise and have a bit of mental peace knowing there isn't a copy of my ID floating around ready to be poached. 

[Marina1456]

Use booking.com.  If all hosts move over to them you will still find amazing places to stay.  I am no longer going to host on Airbnb for new listings

[Mark3614]

Absolutely right!  It is an invasion of privacy and a serious risk of identity theft.  I have been both a host and guest with Airbnb for many years but will not be in the future.

[Renae32]

We just killed an AirBnB reservation when they insisted that we upload government issued ID.  Sorry to you hosts but this is an unwarranted invasion of our privacy and an invitation for hackers.  Trust is a two-way street.  We trust your reviews from other guests and you need to trust our reviews from other hosts which are all top-rated.  We don't ask for your government ID and you have no business asking for ours in advance or online.  If you want to see ID when we check-in we will show it to you.  But we will not upload it online.

[Sarah977]

@Renae32   I think it's reasonable for hosts to ask for the full names of everyone on your booking, but asking you to send them copies of your ID seems unnecessary, as long as you are willing to provide it on arrival. 

Although you should be aware that there are countries where hosts are required to submit ID to the govt. for all their guests. But they would normally explain this to guests as the reason, and it's easy enough to verify if it's true for that country. 

[Mark3614]

Not surprisingly my critical post of Airbnb was not allowed!  I suppose this will not get to the "community either"

[Mark3614]

Wow seems to have got though the algorithms, anyway we are leaving Airbnb as we're not prepared to put ourselves at risk of identity theft by uploading government ID, and we certainly don't expect our guests to!

[Sarah977]

@Mark3614  This forum is filled with posts critical of Airbnb. Your post didn't get removed unless you used profane language- this forum is glitchy- when you compose a longish post, it will often time out and when you hit reply, it gets lost in cyberspace. Those of us familiar with that copy a post before clicking on reply, so we can just paste it into the message box again.

This forum isn't managed by Airbnb, but by forum moderators who aren't actually Airbnb employees, but contracted out. They're a good bunch who tend to try to help out hosts and guests who post here by pinging issues over to Airbnb CS.

The only things which get removed are things that violate policy, like swearing, personal attacks, discriminatory comments, personal info like phone numbers and email addresses, and advertising. Posts critical of Airbnb are not removed.

[Mark3614]

Well there was certainly no profanity, personal attacks or discriminatory comments in my post, simply a brief account of the appalling way Airbnb  are treating hosts and guests alike.  If they are not interested in my views that's fine, I will be dispensing with their services forthwith.  

[Sarah977]

@Mark3614  Wow, you entirely missed what I was trying to tell you. I said your post did not get removed, it's just glitchy software that causes a post to disappear into cyberspace but if you copy it before you hit Reply, and it disappears, you can paste it back into the message box and hit reply again and it will post.

I was explaining the reasons posts  would get removed (and even then, usually only the offending words get blocked, not the entire post), not implying that you had written anything like that. My assumption was that you hadn't, that you just encountered that software glitch, not that anything had been censored.

Understand, now?

[Mark3614]

No, I understood completely what you said, I simply informed you that my post contained nothing in your list of reasons that a post might be removed.  I therefore accept this may have been due to a software glitch and I'm sure your moderators are a "good bunch".

I do appreciate the fact you respond quickly to posts, unlike Airbnb customer services who ignored multiple messages over the course of several weeks and when I eventually spoke to a representative, they were unable to help despite agreeing with my reasoning.

It is extremely annoying to be forced to cancel 14 booking taken through Airbnb and re-let the dates though Vrbo and TripAdvisor.  Airbnb may not care about their reputation but we certainly care about ours.

I am not the only one that has concerns over security and it appears thousands of hosts and guests are not prepared to upload government ID to Airbnb's server.  If Airbnb wish to implement this for new new members that's fine, they have the choice to join or not.  Applying it retrospectively to hosts that have been a member for many years with forward booking already taken is unnecessary; "Pausing payouts" is basically blackmailing us to comply!

Clearly this is an issue for the management to address as CS were unable to help, perhaps you may have better luck than I.

Kind regards

Mark Butcher